


A City in Motion

by startyourbenjens



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Eventual Smut, F/M, Gun Violence, Mentions of Gun Violence, Slow Burn, Some dark themes, abby & marcus solve crime together, eventual Dad!Kane
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-16
Updated: 2018-07-23
Packaged: 2018-12-02 20:02:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 24,988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11516433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/startyourbenjens/pseuds/startyourbenjens
Summary: Modern AU featuring Doctor Abigail Griffin who meets Detective Marcus Kane as he is wheeled into emergency surgery after taking a bullet to the gut to save Governor Jaha. Meeting the people who are waiting for him to recover, his stern but concerned partner Detective Indra Woods, and his estranged mother, Abby is just starting to feel sympathy for the wounded detective when he wakes up and opens his mouth and she realizes that she might prefer him when he’s unconscious.Rated M for later chapters. Slow burn modern au featuring some (minimal) dark themes of gun violence, eventual smut, & eventual dad!kane.





	1. prologue

She’s almost home free. It’s been eleven hours of non-stop consultations, rounds, meetings and one emergency appendectomy that have kept her on her feet for ten of those eleven hours. Her feet are screaming in a pained relief as she sits on the cool bench with her back toward the row of tall metal lockers adjoined to the wall. The cold surface sends a shiver down her spine, shaking her shoulders. The heat of the staff showers connected to the co-ed locker rooms was bliss on the tight muscles of her neck as she rolls her head left and right, feeling the bones protest at each slow pull and crack.

  
Abby loves her job.

  
It’s the third hardest thing she’s ever done in her life, becoming a doctor. The long hours spent on her feet without knowing when she might be able to take a real break that includes sitting in a comfortable chair and eating food heavy with starches to give her a last rush of energy to push through the remainder of her shift, the mental tax it takes to recall the plethora of patient files, sorting through each memorized fact to find the correct diagnosis is worth it when she’s able to truly help someone. If she can give them the peace that comes with simply having a diagnosis and a treatment plan, a little bit more time with their families or or better yet, her favorite of all, a lot more time with their families makes the achingly long hours and the swollen ankles worth it. The paycheck she takes home is a balm more than a bonus to the sense of right she gets from her job. It helps to make up for all the time spent away from the one person she would always rather be with than here at the hospital.

  
The first hardest thing she’s ever done was being becoming a mother. It never stops being difficult, she’s learned. There’s no going home from motherhood, no breaks to take or lunches to stop thinking about what responsibilities await her. Even having a kid as good as hers, because Clarke is truly a gift in Abby’s mind, doesn’t take away the little fear that lingers in the hours of unknown. Every ambulance rushed in, every kid carried on a stretcher or any time one of her patients shows long twists of vibrant blonde hair, they’re all Clarke. It’s good in one of the most terrifying ways. It reminds her of why she’s doing this. Even if there was an option to get a break from the worry and the anxious way her eyes pull toward the front door as she waits for Clarke to come home, Abby wouldn’t take it for a second.

  
The second hardest thing she’s ever done, the one she would change if she had just one wish, was becoming a widow.

  
Marrying Jake was the easy. It was simpler than the choice to become a doctor or the frightening, terrifying, absolutely fulfilling decision to start a family with that same easy-going, easy-to-love man. Being with Jake made waking up at ungodly hours for residency rounds effortless knowing that she could come home to the comfort and the solidarity of him. How much simpler it was to let sleep claim her when she could rest her body against his. Jake gave her strength and he gave it to her willingly with every molecule of his body. He would give to her and then five years into their marriage and eight hours of labor later, he gave it all to Clarke as well. She never questioned their infant daughter's safety while she rested in the cradle of Jake's arms. How could she when Abby found the same comfort in them? Nightmares shadowing the horrors of the hospital didn’t plague her as much in those better nights when his breath ghosted warm over her forehead and she could fall asleep listening to Clarke’s soft cooing on the quiet of the infant monitors. In retrospect, Jake made her whole life easier. She couldn't see it then, not all the time and not when she was too angry at him for unintentionally making her feel guilty about staying late but she knew it in the little moments. Abby knew when the coffee was already rich in her nostrils after she entered her kitchen in the morning that Jake made her life easier. Losing him was impossible. It broke down the fabric of her life on every scale. It was weeks before she could process waking up five minutes earlier than normal to start the coffee on her own. 

  
Feet grazing the polished hospital floor, Abby leans back against the tall locker, head lolling upon the cool surface. She can’t stop her tremble when the wet fabric of her scrubs meets the cold metal and a soft grown escapes. One moment, that’s all she needs. Abby only needs one moment to rest and collect herself before she can grab her keys and a purse that’s seen better days to make a break for the door. The long drive home with the warm, velvety tones of Stevie Nicks carried over the catchy strumming to keep her company will be a welcome respite. It’s an additional relief that she had the foresight to cook extra lasagna last night because anything other than leftovers or pizza delivery seems absolutely out of the question at this moment.

  
“Abby!”

  
_Son of a--_

  
There’s a split second of guilt that sags her shoulders when John Murphy’s voice can be heard huffing her name on a panted breath. She allows her tired bones one low dip of disappointment because she knows that whatever message he ran down here to bring her means she isn’t about to go home. She’s needed here. Stevie Nicks and more importantly, Clarke, will have to wait. The guilt and its self-recrimination disappear as swiftly as they came on, shoulders no longer falling low but tensed back as the muscles ache at her because whatever has happened, it’s urgent and more pressing than her own weariness. John is one of the best nurses on their staff and whatever the mixed reviews are for his bedside manner, Abby knows him to have a genuine concern for her well-being. She didn’t recognize it at first. She didn't see it until she was deep into a meeting with two of her colleagues and John stopped by her office before he left, updating her on his progress and plans for the next day.

  
_‘That was almost respectful coming from John Murphy.’_

  
After that comment, Abby began to appreciate the fact that she might be one of the only people on staff that John Murphy actually cares about which makes whatever matter he’s about to lay on her all the more serious. Her eyes open, body propelling itself forward with elbows leaning on her knees when her gaze meets the nursing intern’s softer, decidedly more _awake_  eyes. 

 

“Doc, we have a gunshot wound to the abdomen and everyone else is already in surgery or accounted for on the roster. The guy’s intestines are everywhere and he’s destabilizing. They’re prepping for surgery now.” She can see Murphy’s gaze sweep over her, the brief pang of sympathy that takes him and then disappears in the wake of urgency. “Sorry, Abby. We need you.”

  
Wordless, she nods. Her body doesn’t scream when she stands up again and the exhaustion she felt only seconds ago is slipping away with each step forward, returning toward the main hall.


	2. unbreak the broken

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning: mentions of blood in this chapter.  
> ALSO check out the STUNNING art piece made by Ched (wondertwinc on tumblr) to accompany this for the Kabby Big Bang!  
> http://wondertwinc.tumblr.com/post/163094422598/a-city-in-motion-by-startyourbenjens-for

It’s nothing short of a miracle when Abby emerges hours later with sweat drenched in each twist of her messy braid and the circles beneath her eyes have darkened another hue of sanguine purple, that Detective Marcus Kane is still alive. The bullet did a number on his intestines but fortunately it made a clean, bloody exit and avoided any other major organs that would have resulted in him bleeding out before Abby could get her hands on him. Now, feeling that familiar exhaustion creep its way back into her bones, Abby makes her path for the E.R waiting room to locate the family she was told would be waiting for him.

 

The room is mostly empty save for a few scattered folk. There’s a couple in the corner, leaning against each other with the heads together. Some are pretending to watch the television mounted on the far wall and the rest of their heads down, ignoring their surroundings. When Jake died, Abby was sitting in a room like this with Clarke on her lap. She stroked her daughter’s hair and stared at the television without seeing anything of what was happening. She doesn’t remember anything that happened in the rest of the world that night. It doesn’t seem like it’s changed much since that night years ago. Right now, she’s wishing she had her glasses with her as she tries to squint at the contact name on a clipboard with his information. There’s a woman sitting in one of the chairs toward the front with her hands on her knees, legs bouncing nervously on the floor while she stares blankly ahead at the wall. If Abby had to warrant a guess, and this was a game she was sad to be pretty good at, this was the family for the man whose stomach she had just spent the better part of two hours holding in her hand.

 

“Miss Woods?”

 

The _miss_ is a formality she learned her first week as an intern. Guessing the family is one thing, assuming the relationship is another. A young woman in her twenties could be a sister or a wife or a lover. Sometimes it’s just a friend or a coworker. Trial and error has taught her better than to make a guess about relationships to her patients. Her unconscious detective listed an Indra Woods as his emergency contact. The woman she pinpointed moments ago turns her head sharply and suddenly the woman is rising and moving toward her. Abby starts to step back, leaning on the heels of her feet but stopping herself from retreating. Woods walks with purposed strides. She’s formidable and there’s an intensity in her dark brown gaze that strikes Abby the instant it’s focused on her.

 

“Indra Woods.” She stops in front of her with the brusque introduction, shoulders squared. “His family just called me. She won’t be in until the morning. I’m his partner. How is he?” Each syllable punctuated with that same harsh strength as her words form around the demand for information. It’s not lost on Abby that this woman isn’t much taller than she is but with every movement she makes herself larger and larger until she swallows up the whole of Abby’s vision, standing inches apart and staring at her with a vehemence that suggests she isn’t accustomed to anyone making her wait.

 

Abby has been at the hospital for so long that she can’t tell if it’s late or early at this point. Her legs want to collapse onto the floor and she’s getting a headache that suggests dehydration. The sky outside is a cloudy midnight grey but there’s a graze of orange implying that morning is starting its slow creep over the hospital. Abby is terrible at receiving orders on a normal day in regular daylight without exhaustion or body tremors. She’s even worse at taking orders right now. It makes her bolder than her normally defiant streak requires.

 

“Detective Woods,” her tongue clips, surprised by her own energy to square her shoulders back, let alone give a sharp retort. Her arms cross over her chest, the clip board tucked at her side. The fact that this woman is probably in her hospital, in her face, with a weapon holstered at her hip isn’t forgotten in the way she bows up to the challenging posture. Not that she would need it. Abby doesn’t agree with physical violence, only strong verbal sparring. Woods could easily take her down one-handed without a weapon. It doesn’t change her stance however. It doesn’t make her less obstinate when faced with someone trying to force something out of her by methods of intimidation. Then her eyes catch what they had missed before in the frenzy of a tall, determined and, if she has to admit it, mildly threatening woman making a direct path toward her.

 

If she had to guess, she would wager that the blood staining the front of Detective Woods’ cotton blue button down was O negative.

 

If she were an assuming person, she might assume that it belongs to the man she just stitched back together. Abby can feel herself softening, shoulders dropping and the unconscious narrowing of her brow releasing its lines of tension.

 

“Your partner is okay for the time being. He’s lost a lot of blood but we’ve managed to fix all the obvious damage. Now we wait and see how his body reacts to treatment. We’ll know more in a few hours.”

 

It’s like watching the wind snuff a candle in the swiftness of a sharp breeze the way Indra’s entire body sags when the burden of holding herself together is suddenly removed. Abby watches the other woman, sees the way her eyes close before she slumps into the closest chair, head in her hands. For a moment, she wonders if this overbearing, thoroughly taxing detective might be crying until she picks her head up again and her eyes are tired but dry. ‘I know how she feels,’ Abby thinks. She sits in the chair directly next to Woods, voice softer this time.

 

“Has anyone looked at you, Detective?”

 

Indra looks down at her blouse as though only now realizing that she’s been sitting in a hospital emergency room covered in someone else’s blood. “I wasn’t injured.”

 

“You should still get checked out. There could be internal trauma or even minor injuries—”

 

“I’m fine.” Indra holds up a hand without actually looking at her. Abby’s lips close in a firm line, accepting Indra’s command to end that line of the conversation. “Do you want to tell me what happened?”

 

“Kane wasn’t the target.” The detective’s dark gaze is something lighter now, eyes rounding as surprise washes over unmasked in her state of fatigue. “You haven’t heard the news?”

 

“I’ve been a little busy putting your partner’s intestines back into his body.”

 

“There was an attack on the governor. Kane jumped in and took the hit.”

 

“Governor Jaha?” Abby had voted for him. She liked seeing his son attending his campaign rallies, lending support to his father. Plus there were a lot of preliminary promises about medical funding to promote new healthcare initiatives and a focus on education that spoke directly to her heart. Jaha had a talent with words which could be him or it could be his speech writers. Abby liked that too. Even after taking office, his policies weren’t completely outrageous despite that she didn’t see nearly as much of that funding as she hoped and the educational values he touted were more aligned with traditional systems. Outdated but effective with the right supplemental tools. Of she had to make the choice between him and re-electing Sydney, she would choose Jaha again.

 

“They’re old friends.” Indra explains. “Kane’s a good cop.”

 

“He must be.”

 

Indra doesn’t say anything for long moments. Abby is accustomed to this, the silence after she tells the family what they can expect. That’s when the next true wave of shock hits, when your mind has a narrowed field of focus on a new series of ‘what if’s’ and possible outcomes. Even a positive prognosis won’t take away all the worries of someone who has been waiting for hours to know if their loved one is alive or dead. It’s hard to believe that, after all the bad things have happened, something good could now begin to takes its hold. Her eyes glance up for the first time to the television screen mounted high in the waiting room. She sees it now, the headlines running across in white letters on a blue banner.

 

_ATTEMPT ON GOVERNOR JAHA._

 

And underneath that

 

_OFFICER CRITICALLY WOUNDED PROTECTING GOVERNOR._

 

Accompanying those baiting taglines are images of the event. She sees Marcus Kane standing next to the Governor at the podium along with a host of other people on either side. Indra is standing to Kane’s right and on the other side of the Governor is a woman with long dark hair accentuated against a scarlet and white dress suit with sharp features that stare out at the crowd. If she’s trying to help Governor Jaha win approval points for his middling ratings, Abby worries her vote in him might have been misplaced. The screen flashes and a young man’s image appears next in a white square box. Unkempt hair falls around his face, covering his forehead. He looks young but there’s a sternness to the set of his jaw that seems older, hardened. This is the man who tried to shoot the governor? There’s no name yet, just a rudimentary image captured on a surveillance video. Abby doesn’t think he could be more than a few years older than twenty, not even a decade older than her own daughter. The young man’s image disappears and video captured of the shooting appears on screen after a reporter warns viewers about the graphic nature of the upcoming footage.

 

The video can’t be more than thirty seconds. Governor Jaha is speaking and the pop is heard like a firework cracking among the crowd before the camera operator manages to sidestep and get a view of the aftermath. She doesn’t see Marcus Kane leap in front of the Governor but she sees that he has been pushed aside and crimson is blossoming from an area just around his navel. Abby knows better. Abby knows exactly where on Marcus Kane’s body that bullet landed and the angle of the exit wound. The blue banner beneath is back as the screen dissolves, returning to the reporter with a solemn voice and wet, shining eyes as she looks into the camera.

 

_POLICE SEARCHING FOR MISSING GUNMAN._

_NO UPDATES ON SHOT OFFICER’S STATUS._

 

“Do you make a statement to them or — ?” Abby gestures vaguely with a lazy wave of her hand toward the news reporters outside the Arkadia City Hall. It’s a selfish question. She’s never operated on anyone deemed newsworthy and she’s hoping there aren’t reporters and photographers crawling around the hospital looking for new details. She would hate to lose her job because she stuck a nosy reporter with a non-lethal dose of anesthetic to get them out of her way.

 

“They might try to ask you a few questions but I think they’re going to be more interested in what I’m doing to catch the guy who shot my partner. I’ll call my captain when I leave and he’ll alert the governor. Jaha will make a statement in the morning.”

  
  
There’s a long _sneer_ , a curl of her lips when Indra speaks as though the name itself carries a sour taste.

 

“Well, Detective Kane is lucky to have a friend like you here to wait for him.”

 

Indra doesn’t respond.

 

Abby leaves her contact information with the blood-painted detective whose shirt has turned from red already to a drying rust, trying to convince her into a pact to go home and get some rest. She promises that either she or the night doctor will contact her if there should be any sudden changes to his status. Indra is only just getting into her car, a cellphone held up to her ear when Abby drives out of the hospital parking lot, weary and sweaty with just enough energy to venture the trip home. Too tired to turn on Stevie and finding no comfort in her low melodies at this point, her mind wanders back to the hospital.

 

Sometimes there are patients who stick with her even after she’s punched out and the Arkadia General Hospital is long miles behind her. Cases who are too vivid to be left in a sterile room of sorrowful individuals waiting to find out the fate of their loved ones. Marcus Kane’s prognosis is positive for the most part. He took a bullet but it came out clean, his insides were a mess of torn gastrointestinal muscle but what could be salvaged was sewn back together and he was closed up. He’ll be uncomfortable for a while, it might be long days or weeks before he can laugh again, but barring infection he should make a full recovery.

 

She wonders if the same can be said of his attacker.

 

That young boy on the news caught in an image of him fleeing the scene, a determination born of panic in the lines of his face, is still on the run. It’s only a matter of time until they catch him. She’s only just met Detective Woods but she’s already familiar with her ferocity, her impatience, and what should be most frightening of all, her loyalty. Tonight was about making sure her partner would survive the night. Tomorrow is about catching the man who shot him. It would be a cliche to call it motherly instinct that makes her sympathetic to anyone near Clarke’s age finding themselves in a plight like this one. It would be equally cliche to think of it as doctor’s compassion, that incessant need to save everyone. It would be lying to call either of those wrong.

 

Whoever he is, Abby hopes he had a damn good reason for doing what he did and she prays for a forgiving judge when his time comes in court.

 

  
The quiet continues for the rest of her drive until the low light of her street comes into view. Her home is a modest two story with grass that’s overgrown because she should have called the Collins boy down the street last week. That’s something Jake used to handle, cutting the grass. It’s not something she can’t do but it’s more that time isn’t on her favor to get it done herself. It’s hard to muster the will to do simple things like call a neighborhood boy in to cut your grass on your off day when she tries to prioritize those sparse free hours with Clarke. A glance at the clock on her dashboard tells her it’s a little after two in the morning. Clarke has school in the morning and should be asleep already. It’s not Abby’s first time working past schedule and she wishes it wasn’t the first time she had to keep working without being able to call and give her daughter a heads up that she won’t be home soon. But Clarke is fifteen and fiercely independent, much to Abby’s chagrin. She doesn’t like to leave her alone so long but if she has to do it once every few weeks, she forces herself to accept that her daughter is capable, has a cellphone to call in an emergency, and the resourcefulness to make it through a few hours on her own. It’s something she’s come to accept based on need and lack of options rather than want. It was easier when Jake was alive with his simpler schedule and two minute phone calls to make sure she was okay.

 

_‘Just making sure you’re taking care of yourself. You know, since you won’t let me do it.’_

 

_‘I’m at work, Jake.’ She scoffs. He never intends to make her feel bad about her late hours. It’s always her own self-reproach but it doesn’t stop the weight of guilt in her chest, when someone else brings up the fact that yes, she’s still at work. ‘ If I could, I would rather be home letting you take care of me.’_

 

_‘I would rather be taking care of you right now too.’ There’s a less than subtle implication in his voice, the way the tone drops and she can tell he’s trying to be quiet in case Clarke is around. Abby would blush, running her bottom lip through her teeth as she fought off a telling smile, afraid that at any moment, a colleague might pass and know by the blush staining her cheeks about the conversation she’s dancing around with her husband._

 

She pulls into the two car garage that Jake built with his own two hands a year after Clarke was born. It took months of frustration and small victories and arguing with the city officials about building permits but he had never been so happy in all his life to press a button and watch the automatic door rise into the roof. Jake talked on the phone with her the whole drive home and he was standing there in a finished, city approved garage, waiting as she put the vehicle in park.

 

_‘Soldier, engineer, architect— is there anything Jake Griffin can’t do?’ She had murmured into his jaw with her arms wrapped around his waist. Her fingers never quite reached each other comfortably when she stretched her arms about the broad weight of him but grasped and teased at the tips. She liked that about him._

 

_‘Can’t save lives. That’s your job, baby.’ He kissed her forehead and when he put his arms about her they crossed over easily, settling her comfortably against him. Abby felt her body sag as he took the brunt of her weight and let her lean on him in the center of his creation._

 

Abby exits the garage quickly, head downcast upon her feet as she walks through and closes the door behind her.

 

Her first thought is that Clarke must have left the television on because there are voices carrying down the hallway. But they’re loud and then one of them is snapping at the other to be quiet and she’s faced with the sudden knowledge that there are _people_ in her house. People are talking in her living room. Her hand goes for her phone, dialing those three emergency numbers swiftly until the next voice cracks the air, thumb paused over the green call button.

 

_‘We’re not going to figure out anything if you both keep arguing. So make nice or get out because I can’t help if you won’t help each other.’_

 

Clarke. Clarke is in there and speaking with them and that means she’s not in any imminent danger. Judging by the way she’s barking orders at the other voices, she must not think there’s any danger at all but Abby would disagree. Relief floods her but it doesn’t loosen her grip on her phone. She holds it close to her chest, screen locked but ready to dial as the other two join in again, softer this time. Whatever they were arguing about, Clarke’s reproach has worked for the time being. With each step she can feel her own instincts kicking in, maternal and fierce and thoroughly upset. Abby doesn’t have a lot of rules for her daughter but one of them is definitely that she’s not supposed to have friends over at this hour without speaking to her first. Especially friends she doesn’t know and these aren’t voices she recognizes. There’s a handful of friends Abby has come home to find in her house. Raven Reyes is slightly older than Clarke, having already graduated highschool when Clarke was finishing her freshman year, with a mouth that Abby tries not to laugh at when she makes a smart remark. Raven and Clarke have reached that point at which an invitation isn’t necessary for Abby to come home and find the young woman in her kitchen or sprawled out on her couch. There’s Anya too but she makes sporadic appearances at their home and Lexa who travels with her usually. The boys voices she knows are lighter than this one, younger. It’s not Jasper and it’s not her friend Hannah’s son, Montgomery.

 

Abby rounds the corner into her living room, arms crossed and ready to dole out stern words to all three people currently occupying her house.

 

“Mom!” Clarke’s gaze finds her first, drawing attention to the newest inhabitant of their discussion.

 

Abby looks between her daughter and the others. The closest is a wisp of a girl clad in dark denim with holes at the knees that Abby suspects happened by accident rather than fashion statement, an oversized faded grey tee shirt and long black hair to match it all. The young woman tucks her hair behind her ear before shoving her hands into the pockets of worn maroon jacket. The brunette won’t meet her gaze, not for anything longer than the split second it takes for her to realize that Abby is still watching, waiting for a reaction.

 

“What’s going on here?” Abby turns to Clarke.

 

“This is Bellamy,” Clarke gestures to the third occupant in the room, the one she briefly skipped over as she focused on the girl, “and his sister Octavia. I go to school with her. I was hoping we could give her a place to stay for a while.” 


	3. George Bailey

It hits her hard and fast and with the weight of a school bus pressing down on her chest. The thick mass of dark curls leading to the strong jawline. The shoulders are wider and he’s taller than the high angle that the security camera footage lead her to believe. Her lips part as she stares at him, a slight movement, the rolling of her jaw while her mind catches up to all the pieces coming together, forming an ugly picture of what’s happening.

 

“You’re the boy on the news.”

 

There’s no room for speculation laced into the tone she levels at him. She saw his face on that television screen in the hospital sitting next to Detective Woods who was covered in her partner’s blood, something they shared only thirty minutes prior. Abby refuses to let her gaze disappear from the boy with his hands curled around the top of her couch, behind where his sister is sitting. The younger girl has her long legs curled into her chest, chin resting on threadbare fabric and tan knees. “You’re the one who tried to attack the governor.”

 

No one answers her.

 

Three pairs of eyes dart at each other around the room, falling on every piece of furniture and surface before landing back on Abby. They don’t have to answer her because Abby knows by their silence that she has spoken aloud the very real fact that this motley group has avoided addressing directly since Clarke brought them here. There’s silence among them all as they breathe in the illusion she has shattered in a matter of minutes. The fact that he shot someone was no longer an unspoken fact.

 

“Yes ma’am.” Bellamy breaks the silence, thick arms crossing over the plain, faded blue tee shirt. Unlike Detective Woods’ shirt from earlier, there’s no blood on Bellamy. But there is a tremble in his voice that wasn’t present when Indra was speaking. He’s very much afraid, dark brown eyes shifting between Abby and Octavia, and he’s very much trying to hide it. When he speaks again there’s a skip in the low gravel reverberations of his voice as it echoes among them in the quiet. Nodding his head, fingers clasped tight at his side to stop them from shaking. “I shot that guy.” He exhales, straining over his words. “I killed that officer.”

 

There’s the young man she saw on the news. That’s the boy with the stern lines and the hard glare belying the terror underneath because he was too afraid to be anything other than recklessly brave. This is the Bellamy Blake who wrung sympathy from her heart because something had scared him enough to pull a stunt this stupid.

 

“No.”

 

It’s Abby’s turn to cut the silence now and she’s had a lot more time to perfect this art. The one word cracks in the stillness. Where Bellamy was only a low murmur, she is forceful and certain and unyielding. Whatever he’s done, what she knows and what remains a mystery, Abby won’t let him linger in this despair, believing that he killed someone. It’s a hard burden to hold and Bellamy is going to have enough difficult things to deal with in his future without the guilt of taking a life on his hands. She continues in those same unshakable syllables. “You didn’t kill him. You almost did but luckily for both of you I’ve spent the last five hours saving his life. We’ll see how he is in the morning but I expect with observation and medication, he should make a full recovery.”

 

Abby watches the relief strike him. The slow moment of denial before acceptance hits him square in the chest.

 

His mouth falls agape. Not a dumbstruck, disbelieving circle of shock but a thin dark line between two pink lips. He stare at her, awed and not without a small, lingering trace of suspicion. He’s worried she could be lying to him, telling him anything to get him out of her house. It’s true, she could be. Abby would go to great lengths to protect her daughter. It’s as telling on her as Bellamy’s watchful gaze is, the one that keeps drifting down to the girl chewing on her nails and pretending that she isn’t listening. He’s looking for a sign to believe that this is true. Abby isn’t soft, the way she meets his gaze, she doesn’t surrender in their staring match. After long moments of seeing pupils expand and contract, her watching more lines appear between two thick brows, and him seeing her firm resolution, it’s enough.

 

His shoulders fall and every tense crack in his facade disappears from his body for one brief, blissful moment. His arms uncross to rest his weight once more upon the back of her couch. Piece by piece, he’s unloading the burden of being twenty-something and thinking he had just killed a man.

 

_The wrong man._

 

Abby can’t forget that the reason Bellamy is on the run and hiding in her house is because he tried to kill the governor and failed. He might have shot the wrong man and that wrong man might be alive but Bellamy still intended to kill someone when he left his house that day.

 

Now he is in _her_ house and _her_ daughter is asking that they protect him.

 

Her tone is sharp, continuing her streak of breaking the quietude with her ferocity.

 

“That doesn’t change anything about this situation. Look, Bellamy,” Abby rounds on him, moving on motherly instinct and her own in the moment spurts of bravery. “I don’t know how long you’ve been here but I did meet one of the many cops looking for you right now. They’re smart. Shell-shocked right now but that’s going to wear off and when they do, they’re going to find you. I’m sorry but you and your sister need to leave.”

 

She _is_ sorry even if, judging by the indignant look Clarke is throwing at her right now, the way her mouth is flying open to argue, her daughter doesn’t believe her.

 

“Mom—”

 

“Clarke!” Abby cuts her off quickly. “I’m sorry but the answer is no. I won’t put you in danger like this. Do you have any idea what could happen if they catch them here?”

 

Abby doesn’t suppose it will matter that she’s never been arrested in her life or that she’s only had a few sparse speeding tickets if a man wanted for attempted murder is found in her house. She’ll be harboring a criminal and doctors who keep their patient’s attackers in their homes don’t usually keep their careers. Even if she could find work some place else, a thought she dreads because she loves Arkadia General and its staff, it would always be a mark she’ll have to explain. It will come up on every single background check. Worse than all of it is the fear that she could lose Clarke. Abby doesn’t know the law and it’s nuances. She’s not even a fan of crime drama on television to have anything more than the most basic familiarity with any of it. It’s never been something she’s had to worry about it. She only knows that something _might_ happen and that _might_ could be something pertaining to her daughter. It’s not a risk she’s willing to take.

 

She knows by the obstinate set of Clarke’s jaw, the shards of cerulean that catch light in vibrant blue eyes that her daughter isn’t wholly convinced that it isn’t worth the risk. Abby used to blame that iron-will on Jake. The stubbornness, the drastically different form in which they weighed safety compared to her.

 

_‘I thought you doctors were supposed to be all about helping people.’ Jake teased her, hands dripping in slick black oil that was filtering into their bathroom sink as he washed it away._

 

_Abby huffed, hating the accusation that she was somehow less generous than him because she remained cognizant of their own plans. Plane tickets bought months in advance and the mother she would have to call to let her know that they wouldn’t be making it home for Christmas this year._

 

_‘I am. I help people all day.’ Abby tried to keep the snap out of her voice to little avail. The words were clipped and she focused sightlessly on unpacking the two large bags she planned on checking at the terminal. She did help people, she told herself. She liked it and even though she wouldn’t admit it to him now, she knows that her husband did the right thing by pulling over to help the woman with her young daughter in the backseat. Maybe she just hoped for a little bit of an apology, for him to not be so sure that he did the right thing and pretend as though that excused the hundreds of dollars they didn’t have wasted on a trip they now weren’t going to take._

 

_‘Hey,’ Abby was so rapt in her anger that she didn’t hear his approach until his arms are encircling her waist, palms flattening themselves over the slight swell of her belly. She can’t stand him for being so much larger than her, for enveloping her so completely in a way that she doesn’t really hate at all. Maybe she’s mad because like everything else he does, Jake knows what’s right and what works and how he can be the one person she wants to comfort her even if it’s him she’s mad at. Abby lets go of the slate blue maternity shirt she had begun to unfold. Her hands fall atop his own while his lips tickle her ear. ‘You do help people, baby. You inspire me to help people too.’_

 

_Their flight was long gone before Jake made it home that evening and Abby consoled herself that even if she wouldn’t be able to see her mother’s face on Christmas day, some other family wouldn’t be stuck spending Christmas Eve on the side of the road with a busted alternator belt so that not even the heat could warm them from the snow._

 

_‘It could have been you,’ he murmured later as George Bailey ran screaming ‘Merry Christmas!’ at the top of his lungs down the streets of Bedford Falls. Abby nestled against him on the couch, a thick quilt across their legs and a cup of hot chocolate warming her hands. She craned her neck up to look at him, confusion etched into the high arches of her brow. Jake kissed her forehead and hugged her tighter. Closing her eyes was an involuntary movement, like breathing or tickling her fingers along the exposed skin above his waistband whenever he was working on a project. Jake was warm and solid and she felt safe in the cradle of his embrace. Safe for her and the life growing within her._

 

_‘I don’t ever want you and baby-girl to be stuck in the snow and no one pulls over to help.’_

 

All of it screamed Jacob Griffin. It was the same bold-hearted bravery that drove her husband’s bone-deep inclinations to act first, question later. She blamed it all on him and sometimes, late at night when she’s laying in bed and talking to the air on the hope that he can hear her, she still blames him.

 

Abby moves toward her daughter, inadvertently shuffling herself closer to Bellamy as well. She places each hand on her daughter’s arms, grasping for her attention, willing her to believe and understand what she’s trying to tell her. Clarke beats her to it, launching into another fevered speech before Abby cuts her off.

 

“It’s just Octavia, Mom. Bellamy’s staying with—”

 

“Stop!” Abby holds up a hand between them. “I don’t want to know. The less I know, the better. The less you know, the better. Whether it’s one or both, it doesn’t matter. You want us to harbor someone in our home who the police area already looking for and will probably track to our home very soon. He shot— Wait.” For what feels like the umpteenth time this day, Abby is struck with the force of a revelation and a question all at once. Clarke is pushed behind her, fingers grasping her daughter’s slender wrist. Honey hues cut to Bellamy with a tense comprehension dawning on the worried lines of her face. “Did you bring a gun into my house?”

 

“No!” Bellamy responds quickly, shock mirroring her own as though the thought of bringing a weapon into someone else’s house is equally abhorrent to him. “No ma’am. I mean, they took it back. They didn’t let me keep it. I tried but he said they had a plan to get rid of it so it wouldn’t make its way back to me.”

 

Abby steps toward him, letting go of Clarke in the process, satisfied that he’s not about to make another poor decision while standing in her living room. Head cocked, staring up at him and God it feels like he’s a foot taller than her but it’s probably only inches. It doesn’t matter. The boy in her house doesn’t seem as tough as the boy projected on the news. “They? Who are _they_?”

 

If there were other people involved, there might be other people outside her house. People worse than the tall boy putting on a brave face. If there was someone else, that could mean Bellamy is innocent.

 

Bellamy stares at her, stunned and angry at himself for slipping up on this piece of information. He stops talking, shaking his head and backing away like she has suddenly taken up much more of his space than he realized. Abby has come to close to all the things he’s genuinely trying to keep separate from them. Things like the fact that he didn’t do this alone. Someone else placed that weapon in Bellamy Blake’s hands and pulled the trigger. Now he’s the one stuck trying to hold it all together on a promise given to him by who?

 

“Please, Mrs. Griffin. Octavia didn’t have anything to do with what happened. She just needs a few days for me to figure some things out and then we’ll both be gone.”

 

Abby doesn’t like this. She doesn’t like the idea and she doesn’t like the feeling that her resolve might be crumbling. She can hear Jake’s voice ringing out in her ears.

 

_‘It could have been you.’_

 

It could still be them. What if this isn’t saving Octavia Blake but putting Clarke in harm’s way? Abby runs frustrated fingers along her brow, smoothing out the worry lines creasing the skin beneath her hair.

 

“What about your parents? Do they know where you are?”

 

“Mom’s dead.” The girl on the couch speaks up for the first time. The room goes silent again as all eyes cut to Octavia Blake.

 

She’s younger than Clarke but not by much, maybe a year or so but no more than three. She’s thin and willowy and every long limb is carefully controlled, wary that she shouldn’t take up more space than is absolutely necessary. She and her brother share the same olive & sandalwood skin with thick raven locks. Octavia stands and Bellamy’s body shifts, waiting for something, watching her. Whenever she moves, Bellamy is only a second behind. Octavia reaches for the faded black backpack that was next to her on the couch, slinging it over her shoulders and hooking her thumbs into the straps before looking at her brother. “C’mon Bell, let’s just go. We’ll figure something out.”

 

Octavia keeps her eyes down on Bellamy, meticulously avoiding Clarke or Abby.

 

Bellamy glances between them both, uncertainty and the ghost of desperation in the low hang of his gaze. Is this really it? He didn’t want to hope for more, didn’t want to believe there could be someone else to help them out in their time of need but Raven swore that if there was anyone who might be able to help them, it would be Clarke and her mom.

 

Apparently not.

 

“Right.” Bellamy nods, cutting his gaze back to Octavia. “We’ll leave. Please can you just,” he pauses, stepping back from the door toward Abby. “ Can you just give us an hour maybe before you call the cops?” He doesn’t wait for her answer before retreating to the door, Octavia close behind him.

 

“You follow my rules.”

 

Abby surprises them almost as much as she surprises herself. _Damn you, Jake_. Arms crossed over her chest, stare leveled at the siblings ready who were so close to leaving. Bellamy turns first, eyes wide, head already nodding along as she speaks. Octavia is slower to round her attention back to them, fists clenched at her side.

 

“Every hour you’re here, you follow my rules. Is that understood?”

 

“Yes ma’am, I swear—”

 

“With all due respect, I’m not talking to you.” Abby crosses the distances between herself and the front door, standing in front of Octavia. It’s hard not to make assumptions about a teenager standing in her living room, glaring at her, dark garb and tattered clothes and an aura of rage poring out of her. It’s hard not to think, oh God, what have I signed us up for?

 

She must be crazy.

 

“I don’t know what rules you’re used to living by,” a brief, furtive glance to the older brother watching them, “but I need you to follow my rules if you’re going to stay here. They aren’t hard and I try to be fair. That’s all I ask and you can stay here.”

 

She doesn’t add _as long as you need_ because she wants to say _unless it gets too dangerous._

 

“Do we have an agreement?”

 

It’s a long, quiet moment of the two women staring at each other, Abby trying to soften herself as they square off. Uncrossing her arms, the gentle way her gaze falls until the sparks of fire in Octavia are dying too. 

 

“Yeah. Thanks.” Only Octavia could express gratitude on a scowl.

 

Abby wants to smile but can't, either from exhaustion or the way her shoulders want to shake with nervous energy. It feels like college with an exam in her first and she's had too many cups of coffee to get a proper night's sleep. She might be mentally prepared and her body might scream for the sleep it needs but her nerves jitter and jump as the morning makes its slow crawl outside her dorm room window.  “Okay then.”

 

Yes, she must be crazy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, I promise Marcus will actually be more than just a name mentioned in the next chapter. Sorry for the long delay between chapters as well. This one was hell to edit but the next one should arrive much faster if all goes according to plan. Thanks for all your feedback! I really appreciate your comments & kudos even if I am the worst for responding to them.


	4. Damn him. Damn her. Damn Bellamy Blake.

She meets Vera Kane the next day. Sweet, kind Vera Kane whose melodic voice greets her like warm ocean waves until she’s smiling despite the chaos swarming around every other part of her life. Vera Kane is wonderful and the news that Marcus Kane woke up in the early morning hours with no obvious complications is a bright spot in the clutter of her morning.

 

Two kids at her breakfast table, two bowls of cereal and twenty minutes of stumbling through morning conversation. Octavia didn’t talk much but unfortunately neither did Clarke, all of them too aware of each other for it to still be so early. Abby did most of the talking, giving an overeager description of what she had to do that day while carefully avoiding mentioning her priority patient, Detective Kane. Clarke nodded along and Octavia ate her Cheerios quietly, putting the bowl to her mouth and slurping the last dregs of the milk before softly padding to the sink to wash the ceramic dish. Abby and Clarke shared a speculative glance, Clarke shrugging off the uncomfortable silence and leaving Abby to fend for herself. Octavia would be in her house, alone, all day. Her cell phone and the hospital and her office number were posted on sticky notes and attached by various travel magnets to the refrigerator door. There was a small stockpile of anything Abby thought she might need to survive the next eight hours alone. It was all passably decent until Abby kissed her daughter’s forehead before she was about to dash out the front door, travel mug in hand and purse in the other. She paused, staring at Octavia who watches her in return. Finally Abby reached out to press her hand atop Octavia’s arm, squeezing it gently before wishing them both a good day and instructing them to call her if they needed anything. She thought back on the exchange the entire drive to the hospital. It wasn’t just about what she was going to do, it was about Octavia. Was she truly so tired and sleep-deprived last night to have agreed to this prolonged slumber party?

 

**No**. Well, _yes_. Yes she was but that wasn’t why she agreed to it. It was for Clarke and Jake and for Octavia. It was her responsibility to set the best example for Clarke, the kind of example that Jake would be. Jake wouldn’t have hesitated last night. Jake probably would have insisted on Bellamy staying there too and argued about it with Abby later. And Octavia…She didn’t know what the world did to Octavia Blake or her brother. She knew that two kids came to her house last night with nowhere else to go because somewhere along the line, someone decided they didn’t deserve to have the best example or the best opportunity and everyone else simply fell in line. She had to help.

 

Like she helped Marcus Kane. He’s her success story, the bright spot she’s looking forward to checking on this morning. Nyko texted her his progress overnight including the moment when his mother arrived and her patient was no longer alone. These are the moments she can cling to at the end of the day when the dark parts of the world encroach. Marcus Kane woke up today and he should be alright.

   
By the time she leaves work that evening, Abby is certain that of the two, she prefers Vera Kane.

  
Indra isn’t there when she arrives at the hospital, a fact she is both grateful for and disappointed to learn. Their conversation was tense and brief last night but it was easy to see how much the stern woman cared for her partner. Abby would have liked to see the relief spread across those cutting eyes when Indra learned that not only is he alive but alert and engaged in conversation with the family who finally made it by his side. At the same time, Abby isn’t wholly certain she could lie to Detective Woods without the other woman seeing directly through her bullshit. There was something honest created between them in that late hour and Indra doesn’t seem like she would blindly accept something if there was the smallest hint of anything not quite right in what Abby tells her.

 

Vera is swift to greet her instead, her amicable nature ebbing out of her soft smile, illuminating the dull hospital fluorescent-lit room.

 

“Doctor Griffin?” Vera turns her attention to Abby who can see the dark circles lingering beneath red rimmed eyes. Her chest aches at the sight, a quick, tight grip squeezing at her heart. She can’t imagine the fear Vera must have felt getting the call that her child had been hurt badly enough to warrant a trip to the emergency room. Losing Jake was awful but the idea of losing Clarke? The notion that the fear she uses to propel herself has become a reality? If she tried, she would imagine it’s similar to the feeling of having a wanted gunman in your home, less than ten feet from your daughter. _If she had to guess._ Vera has pulled the standard blue and beige hospital chair to the side of her son’s upraised bed and they’re talking when Abby enters the room. The older woman is rising and extending her hands toward her.

 

“Hi.” Abby nods, reaching out to shake this woman’s hand with gentle fondness and finding it clasped tightly within Vera’s warm palms. There’s a coarseness to her skin that’s unexpected but not unpleasant. Abby returns the squeezing gesture and Vera’s smile broadens. “You must be the family that Detective Woods spoke of?”

 

“ _Vera_ , yes.” The other woman speaks on breathless tones, her gratitude overwhelming her voice. She looks to her son and to Abby, pulling her closer to the bed and his side by the grip she holds. “I’m Marcus’ mother. The doctor last night told me that you saved his life.” Vera pauses and the wetness at the corner of her eyes is back again. “Thank you so much for taking care of my son.”

 

Abby smiles because if she doesn’t smile, she’s going to start crying too.

 

The man in the bed coughs deliberately.

 

They both turn to look at him, Abby moving beyond Vera with a soft hand brushing her arm reassuringly. “And you are Marcus Kane. It’s good to officially meet you, Detective.”

 

She hadn’t taken time to actually look at his face last night. She was too preoccupied with his small intestine to see the curls that fall over his forehead or the long features accentuating high cheekbones and a strong jaw. There’s a fair tint to his skin, a result of blood loss and the trauma to his body, insinuating that at full health, Marcus Kane bears a much darker, natural hue. Stubble paints his cheeks and chin and she wonders if that was there last yesterday or if it sprouted up overnight while she was conversing with his attacker.

 

“Yes.” Kane makes an effort to bring himself up higher in his bed so as to address her properly. Abby chances a watchful glance to the machines monitoring his vitals as he does so, looking for irregularities and spikes with every movement and thankfully finding none. His voice is strained and tired no doubt from the breathing tube that spent several hours in his throat. He looks for a moment like he wants to say something else but stops at a glance toward his mother. Abby guesses it might be a _thank you_. It’s not uncommon for patients to express their gratitude. Abby has learned better than to expect it and it doesn’t diminish her day if a patient forgets or doesn’t feel the need to express their appreciation for her work. She doesn’t do this job to be thanked.

 

Kane remains silent.

 

Abby focuses on running through a rudimentary breakdown of his medical status. She breaks it down into three parts for him.

 

**What happened:** Fortunately the bullet made a clean exit which probably saved his life since it didn’t linger inside to do any additional damage. She ignores the less than subtle roll of his eyes. The damage done was mostly to his small intestine which means he’ll want to follow every instruction of the dietitian who comes to see him later in order to make things like digestion easier on him. She recommends avoiding anything too acidic or greasy, anything that would be difficult in a normal situation to digest but Niylah—sorry, _Doctor Trader_ —will be able to give him more details on that front.

 

**What she did:** She was able to repair most of the damage. The bullet made a pretty nasty path of his stomach but no visible damage to any other major organs or anything that could impair normal function in time. He has some stitching and the suturing on his stomach should dissolve naturally after a few weeks which will save him at least one of the numerous follow-up appoints he has in his future.

 

**What he can expect:** They’re going to keep him for another few days to watch for any additional symptoms that would contradict her diagnosis.

 

“You’re keeping me to cover in case you made a mistake?” Kane, who has been staring at her without falter, narrows his gaze, cocking his head with the question poised.

 

“No,” She clicks, harsher than she intended. Abby never plans to be brusque with a patient. She always tries to remain aware of the fact that when they’re seeing her, they’re generally in pain and, depending on the severity, have just experienced something possibly traumatic. The condescension is thick in his words though and worse in the way he looks at her. “This is standard hospital procedure. Sometimes symptoms of larger problems don’t manifest themselves until hours or days later. We’ll also be changing your bandages and watching to prevent infection.”

 

“And we appreciate all that you’re doing to get him back to health, Doctor.” Vera interrupts, sliding her hand across the bed to grasp her son’s wrist.

 

“Hm.” He hums, disbelief and derision thick in the short sound. Detective Kane turns his attention to his mother, a curt politeness in his voice. “Mom, could you give me a moment alone with Doctor Griffin? I have some questions I would like to ask her.”

 

If Vera is surprised by the question, she hides it well. Better than Abby would hide it if Clarke were to behave like Marcus Kane is behaving right now. Vera nods, grabbing a worn paperback from the side table and stepping out of the room into the waiting area.

 

Abby expects any number of questions after the procedure like what Detective Kane has endured. Concerns vary far and wide from patient to patient and sometimes it’s easier to ask without worrying about upsetting someone else in the room. Maybe, she hopes, this is the type of question that Marcus Kane is going to ask her. Maybe he’s trying to spare his mother from any additional heartache if he suspects his condition to be worse than anticipated. Maybe it’s an explanation for his sour disposition.

 

“Did you call my mother?”

 

Well, she didn’t expect _that_.

 

“Excuse me?”

 

Okay, that was definitely snappy. To be fair, he caught her off guard. Really off guard.

 

“My mother.” Kane continues, heedless of her attitude or her shock. “She’s not listed as my emergency contact and she wouldn’t tell me who informed her about my condition so I was wondering if it’s my partner I should be reprimanding or if it was some sort of hospital policy to reach out to family members who aren’t listed as contacts.”

 

“No, Detective.” Abby clicks. It takes a long pause before she can answer him, seconds stretching out as she stares down at him, wondering if this moment is real or just some extension of the nightmare she’s been floating through since last night. Maybe she fell asleep at the hospital yesterday and there is no bandaged Marcus Kane and maybe she knows the name Octavia Blake from one of Clarke’s school events. She blinks slowly, hoping that when she opens her eyes, she’ll be staring at the metal lockers again.

 

Kane raises a thick brow at her, waiting for her response.

 

“I didn’t.” She finishes, hand clasping tight to the clipboard while she scribbles notes of his vitals to review later. She’ll send in a nurse to deliver his medication. And change his bandages. Maybe Jackson or Olsen could take this particular patient from her roster if she begs more time to focus on reviewing the intern applications for the upcoming semester.

 

“What?”

 

Damn him. Maybe it’s not too late to suggest a medically induced coma for his recovery.

 

“Hm?” Abby tries again to deflect the conversation.It’s taking an enormous amount of a tenuous self control to bite her tongue. She’s never met someone until now who can look up at her from a hospital bed with condescension thick in deepset brown eyes. Short minutes ago they had seemed earthy and vibrant despite the shadows of exhaustion hanging underneath them. Now she thinks they look more like the mud she accidentally trailed into her car last week.

 

“You obviously want to say something else, Doctor.” There’s a sneer in the way he says _obviously_ , an insult to her intelligence that she should dare to try to hide something from him. If only he knew everything she was hiding from him, he might not sound so smug when he keeps talking. “I’m glad I have a positive prognosis because you have a terrible poker face.”

 

She almost stops herself. For one small millisecond in time, Abigail Griffin doesn’t give a sharp retort to this obnoxious, _ungrateful_ man. Then the world catches up, time rights itself and the tension and the stress of the last twenty four hours are flying off her tongue before she can stop herself.

 

“I was just wondering,” She begins, strained white knuckles digging in to the clipboard’s edges, “if it was really such a terrible thing for someone to contact your mother in case of an emergency. You were plastered all over every major news station. I’m glad that someone called her instead of having to find out from watching her son get shot on tv. She was clearly concerned about you and in emergency situations it’s important to have a family member—”

 

“Thank you for the lecture, Doctor Griffin, on what’s best for my mother. While I am so grateful for your _expertise_ in this matter,” Kane interrupts her before she can finish. “I don’t want her present for these sorts of things.” He snaps, gaze dark and determined and utterly unaware to any world in which he could be wrong. There’s a low throbbing ache growing in her temple. Abby meets his open glare with one of her own. She stood up to a man wanted for attempted murder last night. Even if Detective Marcus Kane somehow had a weapon hidden in his hospital gown, Abby has gone through too much to back down now.

 

“Do you often find yourself in situations like this, Detective?”

 

It’s nicer than what she wants to say. She wants to make a quip about how important it is for his mother to be his contact because the next time he finds himself in front of a gun, it might actually be meant for him. She’s grateful later that Kane doesn’t take her bait. He grinds his teeth, aware that they are both treading into ugly territory of saying some pretty nasty things. Maybe he’s realizing that it’ not his best idea to insult the person currently responsible for not only his medical improvements but also his release date.

 

“I am an officer of the law, Doctor Griffin. It’s not known for being a safe job.” There’s an ugly curl to his lip. Abby knows he’s taking a jab at her.

 

“Well, I hope for your sake and mine that you avoid any future bullet wounds, Detective. I’ll be sure to let your mother know she can come back in now.”

 

 

Abby finds Vera Kane chatting amiably with one of the nurses at the computer station when she steps back into the hallway. The two have their heads bent low together, trying to avoid disturbing others in the room but still laughter makes its ripples across the otherwise quiet walls. The heavy shadows are gone from Vera’s face as she passes the novel she was holding to the nurse who makes a show of not being able to accept it before finally acquiescing to clutch it tight against his chest. Maybe it’s the red flush crawling up her neck to color her cheeks or the lines of stress carving themselves into her forehead that pull the other woman toward her when they finally make eye contact. It could be the lingering white-knuckle death grip she holds on her equipment or how the door slams shut behind her, drawing several startled jumps and disapproving looks from the others in the waiting area.

 

Maybe Marcus Kane makes such a habit of being infuriatingly annoying that his mother is simply accustomed to dealing with the aftermath.

 

Vera looks like she wants to ask her a question and Abby isn’t so sure she’s ready to tell a wounded man’s mother that her son is insufferable. Abby isn’t particularly religious but she has the distinct feeling that some higher power is testing her today. Not that it matters. She’s starting to blurt out about how Vera can go back inside now when long fingers wrap gently around her arm. Vera guides them to two chairs backed against a wall beneath a pastel painting of a field of hydrangeas, forcing Abby to sit down with her.

 

“How is he?” Vera asks in a calm tone that belies the way she’s looking at Abby like she knows something unpleasant just transpired.

 

“He’s fine.” She rushes, lips pursing to consider carefully her next words. “I’ll have one of my associates check on him again in a few hours and the nurses will be making their regular rounds to change his bandages. They’ll report back to me and—”

 

For the second time that day, Abby finds herself cut off by the raise of a hand. Somehow it’s less maddening coming from Vera. Vera who raises her hand gently to stop her before grasping Abby’s hand within her own again.

 

“Doctor, I love my son and that means loving the parts of him that are a little less lovable than others.”

 

Abby stares at her before a soft, tired chuckle escapes. She covers her mouth with her free hand to stop herself but the amusement of the situation is already overtaking her and another guilty laugh falls out. “I’m sorry,” she murmurs her apology, drawing her bottom lip through her teeth and willing herself to stop laughing. But it must be okay because Vera is also starting to laugh, little giggles escaping from both of them. Abby can’t believe that all the anger she felt mere moments ago is already beginning to dissipate by a kind hand and a few simple words. God, she needed this. She needed something to take off the edge that’s been weight on her for hours and Vera Kane’s subtle tease was just the thing.

 

“Now,” Vera begins again, lines of laughter still creasing the soft features of her face. There are pieces of Detective Kane in there, the same deep brown in his eyes is present in his mother, the high rise of their cheek bones that give a sense of strength to both of them. Grecian, Abby thinks, like laurel wreathes and olive trees. This woman and her son were probably buried deep into some moral debate about her being there before Abby intruded and set her patient’s blood pressure to skyrocketing heights. “How is he?”

 

“I think it might be for the best if I let one of my colleagues take over your son’s care, Miss Kane.”

 

“ _Vera_.”

 

“ _Vera_ ,” Abby corrects herself, “I’m not so sure my bedside manner is suited to provide what’s best for him.”

 

Vera considers this quietly, nodding her head and letting go of Abby’s hand. She feels the loss immediately. It was nice while it lasted, she thinks, to have Vera Kane’s kindness. “Well, you shouldn’t be so hard on yourself, Doctor.” She crosses her hands over her lap, subtle nodding of her head and glancing at Abby from the corner of her eyes. “Marcus has always hated anything that stopped him from doing what he wants to do. That includes hospitals. I’m not sure if anyone has a bedside manner suited for someone who doesn’t want to be there as much as Marcus doesn’t want to be here. ”

 

“He probably should have considered a different job if he wanted to avoid hospitals.” Abby says and hates herself a tiny bit more for echoing Kane’s words to her. She continues. “Still, I think it best that one of my colleagues take over. They’re extremely talented medical professionals who are perfectly capable of giving him the best possible care.”

 

“Care that you aren’t sure you could give him now?”

 

Ouch. Vera might not have intended to cut her with words but the effect was the same.

 

“It’s not that I couldn’t, Vera, but as doctors we also have to be aware of a patient’s mental recovery. I am probably not going to be very beneficial to your son on that front.”

 

“Ah.” Vera sits back, considering her words. The sigh that leaves her strikes hard against Abby’s chest, guilt settling into her mostly empty stomach. Despite it all, Vera keeps her smile though it’s smaller now, softer. Her gaze holds the barest flicker of being crestfallen and Abby hates that low hang of disappointment when Vera turns warm, earthy eyes on her. “I understand.”

 

She probably does, Abby thinks and it doesn’t make this any easier. Vera understands and doesn’t begrudge Abby for giving up on her son, passing him off to someone else. She wants to argue that it’s not like that but it is. She wants someone else to deal with Marcus Kane and his stubborn attitude while she deals with the hurricane of crazy happening at her house. One crisis at a time. Surely she can’t be blamed for being overwhelmed, for not being a glutton for pain everywhere she goes? She’s not. That’s the point. This sweet woman has no idea what Abby has going on at home or last night or tomorrow morning and she still doesn’t hold it against her when she doesn’t want to deal with her son.

 

Ugh.

 

“Do you mind me asking you a personal question Miss—Vera?” Abby finishes at a light, reproving glance from Vera. She nods and Abby continues. “Do you know why your son didn’t have you listed as his emergency contact? Usually in these kinds of situations, when a parent or family member shows up unexpected, it’s easy to understand a patient’s reason for that decision. I can’t figure it out with you.”

 

Abby is worried she’s pressed too much when a small shimmer appears in Vera’s eyes. She’s ready to forget she ever asked the question and hastily apologize.

 

“Do you mean why don’t I seem like some awful, horrible person who you can’t blame my son for avoiding?”

 

Abby nods.

 

“Well, thank you, first of all, but you don’t know me well yet. I was a teacher for almost thirty years. I assure you, I can be quite a stern disciplinarian. ” Vera pats her knee and Abby has the distinct feeling of being taken back to school. “For years now Marcus has lived under this belief that I somehow disapprove of his career choice. I’ll admit, it’s true but not in the way he thinks. I just—” Vera sighs and it’s the chest-punching, heart-aching sound again. “I worry about him. The only thing scarier than worrying about if your child is going to be hurt or stabbed or shot at any given point is getting the call that he _has_ been shot. Marcus has always taken my fear of his job as some sort of…disappointment in him.”

 

“Where would he get that idea?”

 

“Because his father would have disapproved.”

 

“Oh.”

 

There’s a wistfulness to Vera’s voice as she talks about him. “Marcus’ father was…He was _good_ but not good at everything. He was passionate about the world and the war and doing anything he could to bring some sunlight into the shadows.” Vera pauses. Abby sits next to her, silent and patient, a comforting squeeze on the soft hand on her knee. Vera smiles, grateful for the kind touch. “He was incredibly dedicated to what he was doing, to what he believed in. Marcus is a lot like him in that respect. Unfortunately for him but moreso for Marcus, that meant he was more committed to ideals of a grander scale than to the people around him making it happen. Or any of the people around him. I’ve never said anything but I don’t really have to for Marcus to know that a career in law enforcement isn’t something his father would have supported. No matter how _proud_ I am to be his mother.”

 

Tears are falling from the corner of Vera Kane’s eyes and Abby knows the same can be said of herself. She wipes away the escaping drops, inhaling deeply to swallow the lump in her throat and pull the tears back from her eyes. She’s not going to cry for Marcus Kane. Or his father.

 

(She might for Vera.)

 

“Well, Vera, he’s stuck in that bed for now. You know, if you want to tell him what you just told me while he doesn’t have a chance to run.”

 

In their chairs, the two women are leaning against each other, shoulders and knees touching in solidarity for each other.

 

“Maybe.” Vera smiles. “Marcus can be incredibly stubborn when he puts his mind to something. I can talk but I have to hope he listens.”

 

Abby doesn’t return to Marcus Kane’s room until she’s making rounds at the end of her shift and she’s tactfully saved him for last. She doesn’t want to be snappy with anyone else on the likelihood that he’s going to piss her off again and in case he does, she’ll have the long drive home to help her calm down. Fortunately when she finally returns, Kane doesn’t seem hellbent on destroying the happy mood she’s built up since last they spoke. Abby doesn’t know if she should attribute this to human decency, remorse at his previous behavior, or Vera.

 

Her gut say it’s Vera.

 

Kane has a stack of papers in front of him on the tray meant to be holding his dinner which Abby sees has pieces eaten here and there like a child refusing its supper.

 

“You’re going to need to eat if you want to recover, Detective.”

 

“I was beginning to think you forgot about me, Doctor.” He responds without looking away from his paperwork and without acknowledging her statement. Abby tells herself that she really isn’t trying to be rude when she starts collecting the files spread out across his bed but enforcing the treatment prescribed as his current primary physician.

 

“I’m serious, Kane.”

 

“Doctor, it’s not my my brain that was shot.”

 

“No, it wasn’t. I suspect you wouldn’t be so argumentative if it had been.”

 

It wasn’t the nicest thing she could have said and it shocks him enough into silence for her to finish grabbing the papers and shoving them into a manila folder on the ignored food tray. She can’t avoid seeing the photos of Bellamy and Octavia clipped to the pages inside but she tries to cover it with her very real niggling annoyance laying inches from her.

 

“I’m not trying to pick a fight with you, Doctor Griffin.” Kane watches her, eyes following her hands as she sets the file on the chair moved back to the far side of the room. He could get it, of course, could get up and grab it the instant she leaves this room. That truth hasn’t escaped her but it doesn’t stop the feeling of satisfaction that comes from taking something away from him. “My team is out there trying to catch someone very dangerous with an agenda we know nothing about. For all we know he could be planning another attack while I’m stuck in here. I may not be able to do the footwork but I can still do my job.”

 

“I’m not going to stop you from doing your job as long as you let me do mine. Some of the medications I’ve prescribed, particularly those that ward off infection which I’ve been talking about since you woke up, cause drowsiness. If you were taking them on schedule when the nurses bring them to you, you should be falling asleep right now.”

 

He doesn’t answer. Abby has already seen the small plastic cup just to the side of his unfinished plate still holding two clear capsules inside of it. She tries for a more sympathetic approach.

 

“Look, if you want to be able to work with your team the next time someone aims a gun at a political official, I need you to take this medicine. I am certain that they would rather you take a raincheck on this case than to die because you were too stubborn to realize you were septic.”

 

Kane laughs but it isn’t the nice kind of laughter when you’ve said something truly funny. It’s a short, brusque laugh that’s mostly nasal and haughty and as derisive as he was earlier that day. “That’s nice but no. My profession isn’t like that. We have jobs to do. Jobs that if they don’t get done will end up sending more people to you. We’re trying to save people here and you’re telling me I can’t look through a few files while I’m bedridden.”

 

It’s Abby’s turn to laugh and she’s less subtle about it than he is. Her scoff is heavier and she shakes her head before she opens her mouth.

 

“All these people who care about you and you’re still—” No. No, she will not fall into this trap. She will not be goaded again into saying something outrageous. She tries to remember Vera and their conversations and how much it would mean to the other woman that Abby has decided not to abandon Marcus Kane.

 

“Still?”

 

If only Marcus Kane would let her be nice and pleasant this would be so much easier.

 

“ _Unpleasant_. I have to wonder if they’re gluttons for pain or you have some secret kindness button that I didn’t see while I was stitching you back together.”

 

“Are you wishing you hadn’t stitched me up, Doctor? I’m not nice enough so I don’t deserve to live?”

 

“No, Kane, I didn’t say that. You’re conjecturing. I don’t decide who lives and who dies, that’s your job. Something that seems more frightening by the second.”

 

“That’s a very ugly way of picturing the kinds of decisions I make, Doctor. I uphold the laws to keep people safe. A job I was trying to do that landed me in here for you to ‘stitch up’ as you are so fond of reminding me.”

 

“I know you saved a man’s life, Kane. I haven’t forgot about that either. Maybe you should try saving your own life.” The last part flies out before she knows what she’s saying, her mouth running only on the impulse to shut this infuriating man and his patronizing attitude down once and for all. Kane picks up on it immediately.

 

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

 

“I’m very grateful for your service, Detective. You saved the Governor’s life and no one is denying that. But you took a bullet for a man who hasn’t been here to see you. Has he even made one personal call to your hospital room to check on you? Meanwhile, you can barely muster common decency for the people who do care about you. Your partner, who waited around for hours to make sure you were alive. Your mother who has been worried about you not just since last night but your whole life, apparently. You might want to look into your priorities, Detective. You have two people who care about you very much but you seem hellbent on repeating history.”

 

Oops.

 

Oh no, that was definitely too far. Abby knows she’s said too much and judging by the daggers Marcus Kane is throwing at her right now, he knows it too. It’s a still, tense moment between them that tells him she knows more than she should about him, details irrelevant to his medical files that could only have come from one source. Damn damn damn. She’s probably just done irrevocable damage to an already tenuous relationship with his mother. Damn _him_ , she thinks. Damn him and damn her and damn Bellamy Blake.

 

“Doctor Jackson will be taking over in case you need anything. Goodnight, Detective.”

 

That night, Abby cries out of sheer frustration on her drive home. She’s so angry at Marcus Kane for being able to make her upset at all. Abby can’t stand that someone with such an obvious disregard for human decency gets under her skin. The tears are hot and she swipes them away furiously, sitting in her garage for fifteen minutes while she waits for the red, puffy swelling around her eyes to go down to passably-tired instead of angry-crying. The girls are on the couch when she finally ventures inside. Clarke has her books in front of her and Octavia’s holding her color-coded quiz flashcards. Abby orders pizza with all the strange toppings they want and lets Octavia choose the movie when she sits down with them.

 


	5. Doctor. Detective.

Abby has steeled herself against the reprimand she’s certain awaits her come the following morning. It won’t be the first negative notation in her personnel file but it will almost certainly be the sternest she’s ever deserved. It will sit among a small, hardly noticeable group of formal complaint notices in the middle of the pages and pages of glowing recommendations and commendations for her gene sequencing research. So she prepares. She braces herself by spending a little more on a venti latte with appropriately sweet toffee nut flavored syrups and turns the volume all the way up on John Mellencamp during her drive. If she’s going to be lectured about bedside manner and becoming too emotionally involved with patient families, she’s going to be loaded with coffee and catchy pop tunes to drown out the berating. If anyone else had to deal with Marcus Kane they might be a little more understanding about her behavior. She might see another commendation in her file instead of a complaint.

 

By the time she arrives at the hospital and settles into her office, she’s armed with a multi-point counterargument as to her strong record of excellent patient care in contrast to this isolated incident. However, she is willing to accept the consequences despite how irrational they may be.

 

Except that there’s nothing in her inbox when she arrives. Not the mail slot on the carefully labeled staff mailboxes and nothing in her email either. Nothing. Hm.

 

Abby has lunch with Vera that afternoon. The older woman finds her while she’s making rounds throughout her patients and insists on buying her meal in ‘ _appreciation for all that you’ve done for us._ ’ For not giving up on her son, she means. Abby would rather not have the reminder that she still has to see him at some point today but she also can’t stand the thought of saying no to the offer of having a nice conversation that doesn’t pertain to internal organs on the wrong side of the epidermis.

 

“Did your son mention anything about our conversation yesterday?” Abby picks her fork around a small side salad, rolling a tomato through a puddle of thousand island dressing.

 

“No. Should he? Is there a new development?” Vera’s head perks up from her bowl of loaded potato soup, spoon stuck in midair. Her questions come faster than Abby can answer who shakes her head rapidly in response, hand waving frantically to clear any worry from the other woman.

 

“No, no. Nothing new. I was curious but it’s not important.”

 

Vera’s small smile and the subtle lilt of her brow tell Abby that the other woman isn’t entirely convinced but she blessedly refrains from asking any more questions about the matter.

 

“Can I ask you another question, Vera? A non-medical question?” Abby leans her arms upon the table. There’s been a thought nagging at her brain since her conversation with Kane yesterday. Vera nods, gesturing for her to continue. “Who called you about Marcus? Indra said it wasn’t her and she doesn’t seem like the type to lie even at the risk of upsetting her partner. I verified and neither the hospital nor the precinct have you listed as his emergency contact. Who told you?”

 

“Oh.” Vera blinks. “Thelonius called me.”

 

Abby stares at her. “As in Governor Thelonius Jaha?”

 

Vera nods, nonplussed by Abby’s shock. “Thelonius and Marcus went to college together. Both political science majors although where Marcus opted to join the police academy afterward, Thelonius went on to law school. Every year he and his son come over for Thanksgiving dinner until recently when he took office.” Abby listens, struggling to picture Marcus Kane sitting for a pleasant holiday dinner with the governor and his son every year. “Thelonius said it was something about public perception. He’s a conservative you know so the notion that the Governor was spending the holidays with another man and his mother didn’t present the right image if he wants re-election.”

 

Abby chokes on a sip of water. She grasps for a napkin to cover her mouth. Vera shoots her a concerned look but Abby waves for her to keep going.

 

“Anyway, Thelonius called me right away. He offered to send a vehicle to bring me here but I couldn’t accept. Driving gave me something to focus on.”

 

There’s a bitter taste in her mouth and it isn’t from the salad. She was giving him hell yesterday about prioritizing the people in his life, touting about how the man he shot doesn’t give a damn about him. She wonders if she actually has to apologize if Marcus doesn’t know it was Thelonius who called his mother. Maybe that is apology enough, preserving his friendship with the governor. Abby mulls it over after her lunch, the weight in her chest staying with her the rest of the afternoon. When she sees Kane later, he’s tidying up the same stack of papers she had collected together the night before.

 

“Doctor.” Kane glances up at her when she enters his room, tucking away his files and folding his hands together on his lap. He looks at her, waiting.

 

“Detective.” Abby returns, short and writing notes on the clipboard hanging at his bed.

 

Abby doesn’t apologize and neither does he. That’s the recurring theme of their interactions over the next week as his recovery progresses. It’s better than the alternative, she supposes, and it’s not wholly terrible every time. They both make a show of being pleasant whenever Vera is in the room. Abby asks about his pain levels and updates him on dosage changes and what he can expect from them. She’s warned the nurses about ensuring that Mister Kane takes his medicine instead of them handing it to him and trusting him to take it independently. Either from a desire to speak to her only as much as strictly necessary or because he’s too embarrassed at being caught in his deceit, Kane doesn’t challenge her on this rule. After all, it could always be worse.

 

She could have told his mother.

 

But no, her conversations with Marcus Kane are short and efficient on both their parts.

 

Indra makes sporadic appearances as well and her presence in the small hospital room makes them converse more than when it’s just the two of them. There’s something about having other people around that forces both of them to act on their best behavior. Neither of them want to admit to anyone else how awful they were or bring up any of the pieces that sparked their fiery interlude. Abby didn’t see the other austere detective again until three days after their initial meeting but then she saw her each time she visited Kane’s room over the next two days. Always with a travel mug of hot tea in her hands. Sometimes she has the chair pulled closer to him as they looked over the files together. Other times she’s leaning on the hospital bed itself, leg hitched up against the frame. Usually this was when they were doing more talking than reading, heads bent low as they blathered on like Abby wasn’t in the room. This was perfectly fine by her because it meant she could try and listen for any scrap of information that might be relevant to Bellamy or more importantly for her, Octavia.

 

“We need to find the sister.” Kane is repeating today. It’s not the first time she’s heard him say it. She almost called Clarke immediately to have Bellamy pick his sister up from their home after the first day he huffed loudly and dropped his own crime scene photos onto his lap, mumbling about how Octavia was integral to finding _‘Blake.’_

 

“Saying that over and over doesn’t make it happen, Kane.” Indra doesn’t bother to look away from the school disciplinary reports on **BLAKE, BELLAMY**. Kane catches the way Abby grins. Thankfully her happiness at Octavia’s well covered disappearance can be masked by amusement Indra’s snappy retort. He rolls his eyes at her, grabbing another file this time with the name **BLAKE, AURORA** printed in black letters on a white background. Abby swears she’s looking at his blood pressure reports when she sees what is unmistakably a mugshot photo of a woman with hard features and the same raven hair as the girl that’s been sitting at her breakfast table every day this week.

 

“She worked at Mount Weather?” Abby questions, the words jumping out at her from the manila file. Abby had done an internship there more than a decade ago when she was working her way through medical school. Mount Weather Research Facility was much smaller then. It was one building with a few offices. The bulk of ‘the Mountain’ was a lab that had spent the bulk of its budget on its technology. Now Mount Weather was branched out, large buildings with the industrial steel structures and a sleek, sharp modern interiors. Abby worked closely under Dante Wallace to learn about experimental treatment programs including procedures as well as the business aspect of it all such as presentations and protocol to avoid breaking any laws or incurring damaging legal fees. Of course, most of that information was outdated now but it was an invaluable prelude to her current research. The Mount Weather name carried respect and power among her industry.

 

Kane closes the file on Aurora Blake quickly, papers slapping together between his hands.

 

“Desk clerk.” Chimes Indra. “Mostly in recruitment for experimental drug therapy programs until she started participating too much in her own work.”

 

“The sister is more important. She was scheduled to be taken into state custody three weeks ago when they both disappeared.” Kane rattles off in perfunctory tones and this is information she’s heard before. Abby hasn’t had the heart to ask Octavia about the situation at home. Bellamy was obviously old enough to be a legal guardian for his sister. Something must have happened but Octavia did not leave room for questions about any of the things that happened in her life.

 

Her attention draws back to Kane as he’s speaking. “The question is why would Blake show up again after they were almost in the clear?”

 

“Why was she being taken away?” Abby is careful not to look at him, to keep herself focused on the machines. She tugs away the blankets, dislodging the papers in her way. Kane’s objections are without strength as she pulls high on his hospital gown, revealing the long vertical patches of white gauze covering his midsection. Indra chooses that moment to remove herself to the other side of the room. Abby grins and shakes her head at both of them while pulling away the dressing and tenderly applying her hands to the purpled area. “Do you think the sister had something to do with it?”

 

He shakes his head.

 

“Unsuitable living conditions.” Marcus answers tersely, watching her hands move about his body and wincing slightly as she grazes closer to the entry point. “She was on report for truancy. Missed weeks of school. A visit to the home by social services deemed it unfit. They had a month of weekly visits to improve but my guess is that they couldn’t get it together. Social services was on schedule to pick her up but when they arrived, she and her brother were gone.”

 

Abby stops her appraisal of the puffed pink flesh, the lines of red that stand out against the other warm hues of Marcus Kane, to listen to him. Her hands rest on the undamaged skin to either side. Kane coughs, glancing down to where she was paused in her examination. Her palms flat on his stomach, the blanket having fallen precariously low. _Oh. Right_. Abby gently replaces the gauze, gingerly applying pressure to the medical tape to secure it back in place.

 

“Poor girl.” She murmurs, pulling herself away from him.

 

“Hm?”

 

“ _Poor girl_.” Abby emphasizes. “It sounds like a sad home situation for a young woman.”

 

“Do you have children, Abby?” Indra, apparently deciding that her partner was suitable enough for her eyes once more, rejoins them like she never left with her hip cocked up against the bed in one fluid motion.

 

“I do. A daughter.”

 

“Ah.” Indra nods her head, brows lifting and falling as though this admission somehow confirms something she already suspected. “How old?”

 

“Fifteen.”

 

“Same age as my daughter.”

 

“And our missing girl.” Adds Marcus, perusing his files again. Abby doesn’t like the way this information has passed so quickly among them all. She doesn’t like that she’s somehow admitted she might have any potential connection to Octavia Blake purely because her daughter and the girl they’re looking for are the same age.

 

“She hasn’t mentioned anything but I can ask Clarke if she knew her? They might have been classmates.”

 

Kane regards her openly, his gaze unmoving from where she works. He nods eventually, seemingly placated by her proffering of assistance. “That would be helpful. Thank you.”

 

Of all the things to warrant gratitude, this is what he appreciates?

 

Abby opens her mouth only to close it again, reminding herself that they are in front of Indra and that means adhering to their unspoken agreement to be civil. It means that she doesn’t have to think of some sharp comeback and can let her floundering of words sit in the silence. Fortunately, Indra feels no such compulsion and moves through their tension like fingers through water, making ripples and brushing aside what weighs her down.

 

“I already spoke to Gaia. They shared a few classes but no real connection. She said she was quiet, not a lot of friends and the ones she did have were questionable at best. Potheads and miscreants. My words, not hers.”

 

Abby feels another biting instinct leap to her throat. Surely she didn’t include _Clarke_ among those listed? “Well, at least she had her brother.”

 

“Her brother who shot me? That brother?” Kane turns his head sharply toward her. Indra looks to her as well. Abby clears her throat.

 

“Yes,” She recovers, feeling an insane urge to defend Bellamy Blake rising in her. “That brother. Don’t you wonder why a boy with a sister to take care of would do something so stupid, Detectives? It doesn’t make sense unless he had a damn good motivation.”

 

She can feel his eyes focused on her, watching her as she moves about the room, checking this and that and feigning disinterest.

 

“Indra,” Kane’s voice breaks the silence of the room. There’s a soft politeness to it that sounds strange coming from him. “Would you do me a favor and have McIntyre pull the file on Raven Reyes for me? She’s another one who just escaped social services by aging out. She and Blake had the same case worker and we have reason to believe they know each other.”

 

“Hm.” Indra clips, unimpressed. Her shoes thud evenly on the hospital floor until the door closes and it’s just them. Kane pushes himself to sit higher in the hospital bed. The muffled sounds of pain hissing through his lips have Abby returning swiftly to his side. She bites back a sharp scold for trying to do too much while he’s still healing. Instead, with her hands on his shoulders, she helps him to steady himself into a more comfortable position. Marcus Kane is a tall man by his charts and it’s evident by how his head is level with hers when he sits forward. He’s looking at her again but it’s gentler this time. The defensive glare in his gaze has disappeared as he regards her now.

 

“I want to apologize for my behavior the other day. I was upset for something beyond your control and took it out on you. It’s not an excuse for my behavior but it is the truth of what happened.” The explanation rushes from his lips and his hands gesture vaguely about the room with each word. They wave in the air and tuck his hair behind his ear until falling flat at his side. Marcus pauses again. “I’m sorry.” This time the words are slow, forced but no less genuine. Marcus Kane and apologies do not often cross paths and they crash together in the silence.

 

He looks better, like this, she thinks. When he’s not holding up these walls of authority and duty and can resemble a human being with a heart and a conscience. It makes him softer around the eyes and how his jaw unclenches as the weight of his guilt starts to drift away. “Apology accepted… and I’m sorry too. For what I said.” Abby takes a deep breathe, her arms crossing over her chest. She had meant what she said and it would hold true if not for one glaring inconsistency in her beliefs that evening.

 

“In the spirit of truth and apologies, you should know it was Governor Jaha who called your mother. In case she hasn’t already told you, I managed to do some detective work of my own. I assume you’re calm enough that I don’t have to sedate you now that you know who the culprit was?” Abby is the master of teasing without smiling, of letting the mirth and the humor steep in through a thoughtful glance holding mischief behind it. Marcus isn’t like that. She watches the information pass through him, realization, the pieces fitting together, and then the lopsided smile that lets slip a quiet chuckle.

 

He shakes his head in disbelief but there's no anger in his smile or the way dark brows rise and fall in recognition. “I should have guessed. He has a tendency to meddle in matters that aren’t his to play with, despite my requests.”

 

“I can see why your mother is so fond of him.” Abby teases him again, the corner of her lips twisting slightly as she fights away a smile. Kane scoffs.

 

“My mother is fond of everyone.” He rolls his eyes before going quiet again. Abby takes his moment of introspection to watch him. These are the moments she most familiar with for her patients. Seeing them silently go through their inner battles, hosting conversations with themselves while the world plays on around them. Kane isn’t looking at her this time when he speaks. His eyes stare forward, memories playing out while he talks. “It’s not that I don’t want her in my life. That’s what everyone thinks, that it’s something against her. That I’m pushing her away because I’m angry or because I’m embarrassed.”

 

The thought had crossed her mind. The dynamics between Marcus and his mother were still very much a mystery to her. The idea of why anyone might keep Vera Kane at bay was ludicrous and in her spare minutes here and there, Abby had wondered more than once what Marcus Kane’s reasons could be for keeping her at a distance. Kane shifts uncomfortably. “I don’t want her in _this part_ of my life and this part is all there is. She’s a retired teacher, she a minister at her church back home. I don’t want to upset the life she’s made for herself with the fragments of mine.”

 

Like brushing back his hair rolling up his sleeves, Marcus has a nervous habit of rushing through the ugly words, the ones that frustrate him because they touch the deepest. They climb their way out of his chest and into his throat until they’re uncontrolled syllables hurtling themselves forward, wanting desperately to be spoken aloud to someone. Abby’s shocked when it falls out and then, humbled that it’s her to hear them. Marcus is surprised too. Yesterday, last week, an hour ago— Doctor Abby Griffin is the last person he would ever expect to dump his emotional baggage on but it’s too late to take it back now. It was one matter to quietly acknowledge this truth to himself. There it could remain a dwindling sacrificial piece of himself, happy to slowly die away until it calcified to something almost normal inside him. Maybe it was because she’s a doctor, he hopes. Maybe it’s some post-traumatic symptom of being shot that’s lowered his emotional defenses somewhere in his subconscious until Abby Griffin was there to knock down the walls and lay him open again.

 

“As a mother,” Abby begins carefully, turning herself to lean against the hospital bed railing. He picks his head up from where it was staring blankly forward, finding her looking back at him. “I would rather have fragments of my child’s life than to have nothing at all. Sometimes you can make something amazing just from the pieces.”

 

“Does Clarke give you the fragments?”

 

Marcus wants to level the emotional playing field between them but can’t quite find it in him to muster the bitterness that would require. Instead his question falls genuine and curious, needing to know if what she’s suggesting is truly possible at all.

 

Abby nods. “Some pieces are smaller than others but yes, she lets me in on a lot.” She pauses on her next sentence. Her arms fall from across her chest, fingers wring together in her lap. She’s still not sure that Marcus Kane deserves this deeply personal information from her that sits on her tongue. It’s hard to share these pieces of her that are pieces of Jake. It’s hard to bring them to the light for someone else to see when she wants to keep them so close to herself, afraid to share what she can’t take back. “Her father passed away a few years ago. It was,” Abby struggles to find the words, her heart rising into her throat as the words begin to break in quiet pieces. “ _Unexpected._ But we wouldn’t have made it through those ugly pieces if we tried to protect each other from them. We had to make it a point to lean on each other. We still do.”

 

“I’m sorry for your loss.” Marcus murmurs, head hung low but angled toward her. His fingers twitch and curl like they’re fighting with a decision. Like he can’t decide if he should reach out and take her hand or if he still hasn’t earned that right to give her even the smallest bit of consolation.

 

“Yeah.” She agrees. “Me too.”

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry I'm the worst who made you all wait an entire month before posting again. Thank you again for your continued support, kudos, and comments!


	6. Conjecture & Coercion

 

 

Her conversation with Kane and Indra doesn’t leave her. It’s in the back of her mind, worrying about Clarke and Octavia. Octavia who is sitting in her house all day, can’t go to school without the fear of being picked up by police officers to be questioned about her brother. Or worse, the fear of being caught by the other people who are probably looking for her brother right now. The people who orchestrate murders at the hands of children. Then there’s the notion of Clarke coming home only to be surprised by a house full of uniformed officers, being left in that situation alone because Abby is too busy being taken away from her job in handcuffs.

 

It’s too much. It’s too much without a proper escape plan if things start to spiral out of control and she’s not there to take the wheel.

 

She calls Clarke on her way home that afternoon after leaving her office early.

 

“Get Bellamy over to the house. There are some things we need to discuss and he needs to be there for it.”

 

She’s been careless in allowing this to go on without an idea of what to do next, no contingency plan to rely on. Now that Kane is getting better, he can look forward to being discharged soon. Already he’s taking long walks around the hospital floor with his mother close at his side. A choice entirely more of Vera’s will than his. Yet more worrisome than the recovering Detective Kane is his team championed by the enigmatic Detective Woods. They’re starting to look in the right direction by chasing after Octavia and her initial concerns when this ordeal started are wracking her nerves once more. Information she didn’t want to have before — where Bellamy’s staying, who helped him in case she needs to contact them, the progress on his plans to leave town— has suddenly become vital for her daughter’s safety.

 

“What? Mom, we’re not sending her away are we? _We can’t_. Bellamy isn’t ready. He said he would call us when it was time.” Her daughter’s words come at her in a panicked rush, syllables falling together as that shaky tone lilts her words. It’s Clarke’s fear that keeps Abby calm.

 

“I’m aware of that. Call him and get him over. I just need to talk to him.” Her tone doesn’t leave room for argument. It’s low and firm but absent of scolding remarks. Clarke reluctantly agrees and hangs up the phone. Abby hears the silence on her phone and tosses it into the passenger side.

 

The girls are in her living room when she gets home. In one week they’ve become an entity together. _The girls_.

 

“Bellamy said he’ll be here in a few minutes.” Clarke watches her mother enter the room, eyes following her movements as she deposits her purse on the hardwood coffee table, toeing off hospital-worn shoes. She’s despondent, as though she doesn’t wholly believe Abby when she says that she is not kicking Octavia out.

 

Abby sits next to them in silence at first. “I’m not making you leave, Octavia. That’s not what this is about.”

 

Octavia doesn’t look at her. Abby thinks the girl isn’t going to acknowledge her at all until a terse “ _okay_ ” leaves her lips behind the chew of painted-black fingernails. Octavia seems about as convinced as Clarke on the matter. Abby tries not to take it personally, to understand that she would react similarly if put in their situation. They were starting to get into a routine, all of them finally becoming comfortable with each other when Bellamy is called back over. It doesn’t matter that Abby hasn’t done anything against them, that so far she’s been reliable and helpful. The world hasn’t been reliable to them. The world has shown these kids over and over that they can’t get comfortable.

 

The knock startles them all. Abby rises swiftly from the couch to answer it.

 

First on the list of things they need to decide: No coming through the front door. She’s glad she had Clarke call him because if this is any indication, they need to create a solid, error-proof execution if the detectives get too close before Bellamy can find a way to get him and his sister to someplace far and safe. Abby opens the door.

 

It’s Indra.

 

With backup. Two other vehicles with the world _POLICE_ painted across the side in bold black letters are outside her house. If Indra is saddened at the thought of arresting someone she was getting to know, someone who saved the life of her partner, she hides it in the scowl and narrow gaze that greet Abby on her own doorstep.

 

“Doctor Griffin, we have reason to believe that Bellamy and Octavia Blake may be inside.”

 

“Doctor Griffin?” Abby crosses her arms in front of her chest. “It was _Abby_ earlier today. Remember, at the hospital where I was providing medical care to your partner?”

 

“As well as listening in to our investigation to better help you in hiding a criminal. Yes.” Indra levels her stare at Abby. “I remember.”

 

“What reason do you have to believe that I would hide either of those kids in my house?” Her denial, for one thing. Abby doesn’t need the silent plea amidst the stone wall of Indra’s reaction that her lack of cooperation is already confirming what they are all suspecting. Suspicions are useless, however, without search warrants and they have no tangible proof of Octavia or Bellamy’s presence inside the home.

 

Yet.

 

Abby needs to get back inside to tell Clarke to cancel with Bellamy as soon as possible before he walks into a trap.

 

“I may not be a detective, Indra, but I’m guessing the reason you’re still on my doorstep instead of in my house is because you don’t have a warrant to search my property. So until you do have one, no, you may not come inside and search my house. It’s _insulting_.”

 

The last part she adds for effect, hoping it will lend something to her credibility when they eventually do come back with a search warrant after digging up crumbs of evidence to convince a judge.

 

“If I have to come back with a warrant, you’ll lose any bargaining power you currently have to keep you and your daughter safe.” Indra knew the magical phrase to shake Abby to her core because they talked about it earlier. Was that the friendly conversation she believed it to be? Or was the sleuth detective fishing for information to use against her when she needed it?

 

Abby steps forward, pulling the open door closed behind her and seeing the two uniformed officers standing behind their fearless leader stop craning their necks to look inside her house. She doesn’t feel this brave. She doesn’t feel like standing up to a police officer is something she should make a habit of doing but she doesn’t have a choice either. It’s not only about Bellamy and Octavia anymore. It’s Clarke. “If you two really want to figure this out, talk to him. Off the record.”

 

Her gaze goes wide, Indra’s head cocking slowly to stare at her. “Are you admitting to knowing the whereabouts of a wanted criminal?”

 

Abby shakes her head. “A friendly suggestion.”

 

\------------

 

Her friendly suggestion shows up on her doorstep that evening in the form of Marcus Kane.

  
  
She’s not expecting any more company when she goes to answer the knock on door. She’s reached out to her lawyer to alleviate her own heart palpitations and her overly-inquisitive daughter peeked out the window in time to call Bellamy and cancel the meeting. It was hell convincing the Blakes plus her daughter that this honestly was not what she planned, that Indra and her team were a complete surprise which is exactly why she didn’t let them in the house even at risk to the investigation seeping into her job at the hospital.

 

So Marcus Kane standing in there in dark denim jeans, a faded navy blue shirt with the ghost of ‘ _ARKADIA POLICE ACADEMY_ ’ lettering on it beneath a black jacket is the second unpleasant surprise she’s had on her doorstep that day.

 

Abby folds her arms over her chest, leaning on her hip against the doorjamb. “I didn’t discharge you, Kane.”

 

“No,” Kane doesn’t miss a beat to throw back a sharp retort. “I had one of your colleagues fill out that paperwork and signed my own AMA form. I was worried you might have a conflict of interest that was keeping me hospitalized longer than necessary.”

 

If her arms were free and not tensed across her frame with her nails digging into her palms, she might slap him. No, she would definitely slap him. She would slap him because while she might have done a lot of things legally wrong in this instance, although the legality of her actions remains debatable, Abby wouldn’t compromise her medical integrity. Not for _him_. Her voice is low and openly contemptuous. “That’s outrageous and you know it.”

 

“Is it?” He looks at her, cocking his head in that disgustingly smug manner that makes those rogue curls fall loose again. “You didn’t ask about their parents.”

 

“What?”

 

“At the hospital. You assumed Blake— _Bellamy_ — had sole responsibility of his sister. No questions about the mother or the father.”

 

Damn. Damn _him_. Why was he telling her any of this? To rub it in her face that she slipped on some seemingly innocuous detail in front of two seasoned investigators?

 

“That doesn’t mean anything and it’s not proof enough to get a search warrant for my house.”

 

“No, it’s not. It’s _conjecture_.” Kane does smile now, something small and slight and Abby wishes he didn’t look so self-satisfied throwing her words back at her. Kane continues. “But it is reason enough for me to have patrols set up around this neighborhood. Maybe parked across the street looking for any suspicious activity.”

 

“Abby!”

 

Callie’s lawyer senses must have been tingling with all that talk of warrants and patrols and conjecture because suddenly her long dark hair has bobbed into view when her friend appears at her side in the doorway. Her eyes are wide and she’s twisting her head in a battle between glaring at her or glaring at Detective Kane.

 

The good thing about being a doctor and going to a prestigious school is making other prestigious friends in valuable fields at discounted prices.

 

Callie steps forward between them, brushing Abby back with a firm hand and scolding gaze. “I don’t really need to tell you that you shouldn’t be talking to him. And you,” she rounds on Kane, long hair whipping around her face. Abby steps back out of the way. “Didn’t you just get shot? Unless you’ve come here to apologize for your impossible behavior, you have no business talking to anyone related to your own case. Even if you were somehow completely healed, something I’m sure could happen under the care of Doctor Griffin who has an impeccable hospital record, you’re still too personally involved with this case to be allowed to work on it, including talking to witnesses or informants. _This_ is coercion. Now that we’re all sure that this investigation isn’t sanctioned by your superiors, what the hell do you think you’re doing here?”

 

Two points to Callie.

 

Kane stops, the lines of his brow furrowed in disapproving concentration as he closes the mouth that he didn’t realize was open when she ran off on her tirade. It takes him a minute to recover and Abby enjoys that minute of shuffling steps in front of her door and the way he twists his head back and forth as he thinks.

 

“I’m asking questions as a concerned citizen.” Kane finally responds. “I haven’t stepped from the path and Doctor Griffin has yet to throw me from her property. I know the law too—?”

 

“Callie Cartwig.”

 

“Ah. Of _Cartwig & Pike._” His thick dark brows raise in recognition of the name. Abby tries not to be nervous. Callie and her partner run a successful law firm. Of course he’s heard of them.

 

“Exactly.”

 

“Charles is a good friend of mine.”

 

“How very unfortunate for him.” Callie nods, unfazed by this new information. “Then if he’s told you anything about working with me, you already know that I’m not going to allow you to bully an innocent woman into stepping aside for you to plant misinformation and unlawfully obtain threadbare evidence to stack your farce of a case.”

 

Three points to Callie.

 

“ _Ha!_ ” Kane’s laugh throws his head back, barking into the night air. It’s sharp and sudden and shakes Abby’s shoulders as she stands behind her friend. “Innocent?”

 

“Innocent.” 

 

“Fine.” His lip curls when he snarls the word at them. Kane throws his hands in the hair, an angry sound leaving his throat before turning on them. “Have it your way. I’ll call Indra and tell her you’ve made your decision. Good luck in court, Doctor Griffin.” His eyes cut to her, upset yes but also desperate.

 

This wasn’t about Abby or getting to her. This wasn’t about their mutual distaste for each other but him doing his job and trying to close a case on someone he suspects is armed and dangerous. He doesn’t know Bellamy or Octavia other than what’s on the papers in his stacks of manila folders. Kane mumbles an unhappy goodbye toward both of them, moving away from her doorstep back down the concrete path toward the black car parked on the street.

 

“Kane!”

 

Abby takes off after him, bare feet on the cool concrete, pushing past her friend who stares at the back of her head in disbelief. Kane stops in his path, glancing over his shoulder at her approaching form. He rolls his eyes before facing her. She almost turns around but stops herself, feet planted firmly, staring up at him heedless of how he towers over her now that he’s not confined to his hospital bed.

 

“If you really want to find out more about this case, talk to him.” She bites her lip and thinks she sees his gaze drift down to the gesture but they’re fixed on her eyes again so swiftly that she can’t be sure. “Off the record.” She adds.

 

Kane is about to argue with her, she can see it. His tongue clicks against the roof of his mouth when he opens and closes it again. He looks at Callie standing in her doorway who is watching them carefully, craning her neck forward to catch the pieces of their conversation. Kane moves forward, closing some of that distance between them. He must have gone home and showered off the scent of hospital from his body because he smells different and his hair is thicker like he’s finally gotten to use his own shampoo instead of generic hospital brand showers. The aroma that permeates her senses is warm like cinnamon and camp fire. He still hasn’t shaved because the hair on his chin looks as dark as it did that morning. Abby finds herself crossing her arms over her chest again, drawing herself together to ward off how he overwhelms her senses.

 

He looks away from Callie, speaking low enough so that only Abby can hear him. “Then arrange it. Off the record.”

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for a short chapter! The next three chapters more than make up for it in length and are in fact my favorites of the entire fic.


	7. Arrangements

 

 

 

The next evening, Abby forces Marcus to give up his phone before they call Bellamy.

She slips it into the back pocket of her jeans before he steps inside her house. It’s a non-negotiable that Kane only minimally protests because it makes them all feel a little bit better that he can’t secretly send a message to his partner about Bellamy. The only other reassurance they could think of was to make sure it was dark when Bellamy sneaks out of wherever it is that he’s hiding. It seems laughably amateur to Abby and when she calls Marcus to tell him what time he can come over, his laugh on the other end tells her he thinks so too. But he agrees and even if it’s only minimally more advantageous to have the cover of night, it’s better than nothing at all. It’s also because Kane has had time to sleep on his request and mull it over all day. He might have changed his mind about this meeting being off the record. This might become very much on the record and transform quickly into a trap. Every car that stops on their street is the car that’s going to contain officers in disguise, waiting to take all of them to jail. She watches all of them, ensuring that every vehicle is someone she recognizes.

It’s not easy to convince anyone to go through with it. She’s had more arguments with her daughter since this ordeal began than they’ve had in years. Clarke pointing out all the pieces Abby’s already terrified of about this being a ploy to get Bellamy to come out of hiding, about how it’s not safe, and how Octavia will be taken away if she’s found. She doesn’t point out anything about their own well-being, about what could happen to Clarke if Kane or his team should decide to press charges against them. It makes her smile later because it reminds her of Jake. In the moment, it only serves to drive her frustration and her blood pressure higher. At this point, it’s the only chance Abby can see of finding the real people responsible for the attempt on Governor Jaha’s life without a violent manhunt for a non-violent boy.

It’s risky for her. It’s worse for Bellamy and Octavia. Abby trusts him though. She’s seen Marcus Kane at his worst and this isn’t it.

Bellamy hasn’t seen any version of Marcus except for the one he left behind, falling down the bloodied stage while he was darting out of the crowd.

He’s glancing around and down the street and over his shoulder when she opens the door. Paranoia is a powerful thing and it clutches mercilessly onto Bellamy. Abby ushers him inside with warm hands gently touching his arm. They pause in her living room, forcibly separated because Octavia throws her arms around his neck the moment they step beyond the doorway. Bellamy hugs her back just as firmly, eyes closed and breath gusting the dark hair away from his face with strong arms high about her middle. His shoulders sag the second they’re reunited. His entire body collapses inward a little, relief pushing away the grief and the strain that was holding him hostage. Octavia is safe and healthy and _here_.

“Look how big you’ve gotten.” Bellamy pulls away.

Octavia rolls her eyes but the smile forms regardless. “It’s been a week, Bell.”

“It’s been a long week.” He counters. He tries to look confident for her sake but only half succeeds.

Abby hates to separate them but Kane is waiting for Bellamy just beyond the open doorway. The longer they draw this out, the greater the potential for it to go wrong. The more he can assume this is a trap or a trick and it’s time to call in reinforcements somehow. “It’ll be over soon.” She glances between the siblings, gaze finally resting on Bellamy. Carefully she touches his arm again, wary to bring him back to that dark place he was in before his sister calmed him. “You’ll have time once this is over.”

“This is my brother—” Octavia cuts in, rounding on Abby until her brother places a firm hand on her arm.

“She’s right.” He pulls her back. “The sooner we get this over, the sooner we can be done with all of this. We can go home.”

Octavia scowls at him for a long moment until finally she gives, stomping around the couch to collapse onto the cushion. The feet of her scuffed black boots rest on Abby’s coffee table. She doesn’t take the bait, however. She focuses on keeping herself between Bellamy and Marcus when she guides the young man through her house. She trusts neither of them to initiate any kind of violent, emotional outburst or Marcus to attempt some petty revenge when he seems hellbent only on justice. It’s for Marcus and for Bellamy because maybe neither of them are truly ready to face the other.

Kane’s dark brown eyes watch Bellamy as he steps into the room, sizing up the man half his age who almost cut his life short. They’re of a similar height but Bellamy is already broad-shouldered and thick even at his young age. Marcus has always been closer to the lean build. Not quite as stocky and it’s been a long time since he’s had the build of a twenty-something. Bellamy is a little less put together than the picture Marcus has of him in a file in his car. The wallet size picture that is paper-clipped to his file was an old academy photo. That young man wore the same look as every new recruit: nervous but eager to put on a show of being ready for this new undertaking. That man had his hair cut and brushed back from his face, held together with gel and sheer determination. This one is a little shaggier, hair a little longer and dark circles sit under his eyes. This man before him has his entire life rebelling against him right down the dark roots of his curly hair. Bellamy’s movements are tight and his arms are drawn close to his body when he finally sits at the opposite end of the hardwood table.

Bellamy Blake doesn’t look like a murderer. He didn’t then and still doesn’t now. He looks, despite his size and the carefully kept together lines on his face, like a young man thrust unarmed into the war zone, desperately waiting for anyone to tell him which side he’s fighting on. Marcus feels the coiled tension in his neck begin to unwind slowly with the realization.

Shoulders hunched, foot tapping through thick black boots on her kitchen floor as the two men plus Abby look around the table at each other. Bellamy starts at the beginning.

Aurora Blake died a year ago.

Bellamy Blake was twenty years old, a trainee of the Arkadia Police Academy while working full time as a night-shift custodian at Mount Weather Research Facility. He lived at home with his mother and sister but was saving up to get his own apartment as soon as he graduated from the academy. Octavia Blake was fourteen, an incoming high school freshman.

Aurora Blake’s death was officially ruled as an opioid overdose.

Bellamy pauses. Abby looks away to Kane who meets her gaze, giving him a moment before he’s ready to continue. Kane doesn’t recall the case but he feels like he should. As a cop, he feels like he should remember when someone dies in something related to illegal activity but if she was dead on arrival then Aurora would never have reached Kane’s casework. She lived and died without his knowing at all. _But he should have_ because it’s part of his job to stop things like this from happening. To protect kids like Bellamy and Octavia.

Bellamy assumed custody of his sister. There was no other family to take them in and he was of the legal age to take care of her so he did. The words fall casually on a shrug of his shoulders, belying the massive responsibility it is to suddenly be wholly responsible for the well-being of another person. The gesture doesn’t go unnoticed by Abby or Marcus.

“Octavia’s special.” He explains. “She’s been through a lot and you can’t throw her in with strangers who don’t know her. I’m here and it’s my responsibility to take care of her.”

Bellamy ignores the drop of Abby’s chin or the loaded breath she takes and how she can’t look at him right now.

He dropped out of the Academy a few weeks later after trying to find the balance. It was too much trying to do it all at once. It was too much to pretend that he could be what he wanted to be and still take care of someone else.

Abby makes the conscious effort not to look at Marcus.

Mostly, he had to leave the Academy because he was afraid of what would happen to Octavia if he finished it all and got hurt. He didn’t want her to end up alone or taken away from him just because he can’t dodge a shot.

“No offense.” Bellamy looks down at the floor, clearing his throat before finding Kane again.

Kane shakes his head. “None taken.”

“The guy’s name is Carl Emerson.” Bellamy forces the words out in a rush of fear and adrenaline. “He’s this beat cop that mom used to know. He vouched for me on my academy application. He was a friend of mom’s.”

_Friend_ being a loose term.

“He put his name on my application and when I dropped out he got angry. Said he got a bad reputation because of me.” Bitterness drips in Bellamy’s tone, lips twisted into a thin, hard line. “Emerson came over to the apartment a few weeks ago. He was banging on the door at two in the morning telling me about how I ruined his good word. Told me that I screwed up someone else’s chance of getting accepted because I dropped out and it looked bad on him. Now he couldn’t say what a great asset anyone else would be because of me. Said that the one time he sticks his neck out, I spit on it and turn tail.”

Bellamy looks ready to run, like his body doesn’t know what to do with anger except to express it immediately. She waits, holding her breath, ready for him to get up and bolt from the table though unsure what she could do to stop him. The tapping of his foot has grown louder and every muscle strains taut in his body, jumping beneath his skin. If he runs, will Kane chase him? To what end? It took so much to get Bellamy to talk to Abby enough to convince her to keep Octavia in her home. Marcus isn’t Abby, he’s a cop. He’s the enemy by default. Abby reaches her hand across the table, palm flat on the hardwood surface. She doesn’t expect him to take it but the offer needed to be there for him. A lifeline for him to cast aside and find the strength to do it on his own.

“He says that I owe him this. I owe him but if I do this, we’ll be even and he can us both out of town as soon as it’s done.” He scoffs, turning his head toward the window. There’s a wetness gathering at the corners of his eyes. They just had to lay low for a little while but Emerson swore he would get them out and Octavia didn’t have to go into the foster system. Otherwise, he couldn’t do anything to protect them.

“Emerson found me…afterward.” They all know what _after_ means. “He found me and he took the gun. Said I blew it again and to lay low. He would find me when he could get me out but I haven’t heard from him since.” His hands are clenched to fists at his side, tugging tightly at the seams of his shirt. Abby pulls back her hand and peers at Marcus.

“What do we do now?” She holds it together until her voice cracks on the last word. Kane is leaning on his elbows on the table, resting his head in his hand. His fingers trace lines down his jaw, following the trail of coarse hair beginning to grow in thicker patches on his chin. His lips form a thin line.

“I can already tell you the bad news is that Carl Emerson left the police force over a month ago.” His fingers drum a line on her table. “It was abrupt. Saying it was his choice to leave would be generous. I can go through old addresses or see if he updated it but if he’s involved in something as devious as this, I doubt we’ll have anything current on him.” Marcus sighs. “I know you’re dealing with a lot right now but I need you to think if he might have mentioned anything at all about who he was working for. Or any other details, maybe something small, that would tell us why they tried to attack the governor?”

It’s strange to hear him speaking in these calm, even tones to the man who almost killed him. Especially as he learns that this same man who tried to kill him was only a pawn, the bottom of an ugly food chain.

Bellamy shakes his head, deep lines creasing around his mouth and on his forehead. Frustration is crashing its way out of him in waves. “All I know is that he wasn’t the top guy. He took the gun back and said ‘we’ll have a way to get you out.”

Kane must see Bellamy’s tension too because he doesn’t allow himself time to linger in the silence. His fingers thread together on the table, words falling in modulated syllables to draw the younger man’s attention back to him and away from the maelstrom in his head.

“Bellamy,” Marcus speaks and Bellamy turns his attention back to him, foot stilling under the table as the silence breaks. “I need you to turn yourself in.”

“What?”

“ _Marcus_.”

Marcus puts a hand up ignoring both of them. “Listen, you need to turn yourself in and tell your version of the events. Right now, we’re wasting time searching for you when we should be investigating into what you’ve just told me. Turn yourself in, get a good lawyer—I’m sure Abby can recommend someone—” Marcus glances to her. Abby scowls and rolls her eyes. “ And we can start moving this in the direction to get you cleared and get the real criminals arrested.”

“Marcus, you can’t be serious.” Abby watches Bellamy whose darting gaze between them is wide with desperation. “You’re asking Bellamy to go to jail.”

“I know.” Kane turns his razored attentions on her. She feels the same tug that she did last night. The challenge and the intrigue, the bracing sensation of being ready to argue him to reason if necessary. “Until he’s apprehended, or better if he turns himself in, all my people are going to do is hunt him down. This way we know where he’s at and we know that he’s safe.”

“And Octavia? ” Bellamy interjects. “She’ll be safe too if I turn myself in? You’ll stop looking for her?”

“She can’t stay with Abby.” Kane speaks first, clipping the words curtly as though they are a non-negotiable by his tone and the way his brow furrows to straight lines when he looks at Abby. Indignation sets heavy in her jaw as she meets his stare. “Hiding her here in the first place was a mistake. It’s not safe.” He pauses again, rubbing his brow with three long digits. His words are muffled and quiet but still wholly unmistakable in the relative silence. “She can stay with me.”

“What?”

“No.”

Bellamy and Abby chorus together again, loud and ready to list a host of reasons why that’s a bad idea.

Heedless of their interruptions for the second time in ten minutes, Kane continues. “My mother is going to be staying with me for a short time while she gets herself situated in town. I’m on medical leave so it’s the best place for her to be where I can guarantee her safety.”

She blinks at him, taken aback. “Vera’s moving here?”

“Yes. We talked while I was in the hospital and since she’s retired now, she’s opted to move closer.” Closer to _him_ , is what he doesn’t say. Despite the absurdity of the situation, the gravity of what’s going on, Abby poorly bites back a grin that sends his face into a hard scowl and a red flush blooming and falling across his cheeks. “It’s safer for everyone.”

It’s tempting but for all the wrong reasons. It’s tempting because she would feel safer for Clarke and for herself. But what about Octavia? Moving in with a stranger and his mother? That hardly seems fair to her. They’re about to decide her living situation for the next what? Days? Weeks? The girl barely had a voice in staying with Abby but at least she had Clarke here to act as a buffer and a comforting shoulder. They’re talking about settling her in with Marcus Kane and no one knows better than Abby that Vera isn’t always enough to negate his unpleasant demeanor. Someone needs to speak for her right now. “She’s been fine here so far.”

Kane scoffs and rolls his eyes at her. “I’ve been in the hospital a week. Tell me, how long was she staying here before we figured it out?”

Abby narrows an unforgiving glare at him. “You can drop the search for her. If Bellamy turns himself in, then you and the other officers don’t need to search for Octavia. She’ll be okay.”

“It’s not the _police_ I’m worried about looking for her. If we found her, how long do you think it would be before others, like the people who hired Bellamy, find her too? They’re not going to show up at your front door with a warrant, Abby. They’re not going to back down if you don’t invite them in.”

There’s a tightness in her chest. It feels like someone is squeezing her heart until the oxygen cuts away slowly from her throat, blocked by a thick lump of fear. She swallows it down, lacing her fingers together to keep her palms from shaking.

“She’ll be safe?” Bellamy’s voice lowers to a whisper.

Kane nods.

“If you turn yourself in, I promise that she will be protected.”

“Fine.” The younger man sags, exhaling his resignation. Abby can hardly process what Bellamy has just agreed to and she doesn’t think he could possibly understand either. Prison. Maybe only the local office, maybe in seclusion but it’s still _jail_. Bellamy agreed to lock himself up for a crime that he is only _quasi_ -guilty of committing. Marcus stands, making a path around the table. There is a brief moment when he falters behind Bellamy’s chair, hand stuck in mid air before committing itself to his shoulder, squeezing the firm muscle beneath his hands. The younger man doesn’t seem to notice it. It falls and passes and Bellamy doesn’t stop staring at her table.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks as always to those who read, comment, or leave kudos!


	8. Okay

 

—————————————

 

For a while, a short, brief beautiful time, her life is passably normal again.

She’s back to one child in her house each morning. Clarke takes a few days to adjust to being alone. There’s a lonely listlessness that keeps her pacing about the house when she’s home and going to Abby for conversation. Abby doesn’t mind. It’s like a nice reward for doing the right thing and helping out someone else.

Her concern for Octavia doesn’t disappear magically because suddenly the surly teenager isn’t living in her house anymore. Especially since the poor girl is now subject to the torture of Marcus Kane with only Vera to combat that agony. Clarke keeps her updated on Octavia’s new living situation.

 _It’s okay_ is the first answer she gets on the subject.

Well, what’s okay? Is okay like he lets her stay up late and binge on candy or is okay like he keeps her confined to whatever room he’s got her cooped up in? Okay could be anything for Octavia Blake. The girl didn’t have high standards for how others should treat her. No one ever taught Octavia that she deserved more from the terrible hand she was dealt in life so anything less than great worries her. Abby can think of a host of things that ‘okay’ might mean but she’s more worried about those definitions she can’t imagine.

“It’s just okay, mom. It’s not great but it’s not terrible.” Clarke, sleepy and eyes still sluggish with sleep, glowers at her over a cup of orange juice. This was obviously too much for morning conversation.

“Alright, alright.” Abby raises her hands in surrender. “Promise me that you’ll let me know if ‘ _okay_ ’ finds a more specific example.”

 

 

 

“He makes breakfast.” Clarke tells her the next morning.

“Hm?”

“He makes breakfast in the mornings. Usually pancakes, sometimes with chocolate chips because she likes them. Basic stuff.”

Chocolate chip pancakes doesn’t sound like basic stuff. Octavia was here for a week and Abby didn’t know anything about her pancake preferences. Or any other breakfast food for that matter. Marcus Kane has had her for a few days and already learned something new. A nagging pit of guilt starts to burrow in her stomach, gnawing at her insides. Abby knows the basic stuff. She could make pancakes or a host of other breakfast foods but things like time-consuming meals in the morning became less prominent as Clarke got older. Abby always preferred to sleep in whenever possible and she thought Clarke, judging by her stumbling from her bedroom every day in pajamas, liked the same. Cereal and orange juice or pop-tarts or nutrition bars on the go were a staple of their household.

They haven’t been the special pancakes type of family since Jake passed away.

“Do you wish that I made chocolate chip pancakes?” She sips her coffee, glancing at her daughter over the ceramic rim.

Clarke scoffs. “No. Who has time for that? I’d rather sleep.”

Abby smiles through a puff of laughter. “Okay.”

It’s okay.

Octavia is okay.

If nothing else comforts her, at least Marcus Kane isn’t in her hospital any more.

 

 

 

The messaging starts less than twenty four hours after Octavia Blake has left her home. She exchanged phone numbers with him for the sole purpose of being able to reach him in case of an emergency.

The emergency being if someone else figured out that Octavia Blake had been staying with her and came to collect on something that wasn’t there anymore. Marcus was the one to break first. Innocuous texts about if he needed to prepare anything or tips he should be aware of now that there was a teenager in his house. Asking if she’s heard of certain television shows and if they raise any red flags on her radar. Abby refrained from telling him that she doubted there was anything on television that could be worse than what that young girl has already seen in real life.

 **[ sent ]** don’t drive yourself crazy trying to control all of it.

The conversations always seem to segue either by her or him. One of them keeps messaging, asking casually how their day was and offering helpful hints about dinner or where's the best dry cleaning place in town until it coalesces into something softer than the heaviness that weighs throughout their days. She knows that Marcus Kane likes The Clash and respects, with a only a few light teases, her preference for Fleetwood Mac or brassy lead singers and their mellow guitarists. They find common ground because she likes the uneven gravel tones of Janis Joplin and he likes the brassy combination of her guitar. She calls him an elitist when he confesses to disliking almost all music made after 1983 and he doesn’t try to argue her on it.

 **[ Marcus Kane ]** I’m not sure you were born when that song came out

 **[ sent ]**  flattery isn't going to get you out of your next appointment, kane

 

 

Tonight, the text message dings on her phone while she’s in her kitchen trying to follow a recipe on her tablet for baked parmesean crusted chicken. The name _Marcus Kane_ flashes across the lockscreen and she tries to imagine what reason the detective could have for messaging her now and at this hour. In her mind, she’s already preparing to stop what she’s doing. Something must be wrong with Octavia or maybe there’s been an incident with Bellamy in his holding cell. She swipes the screen open.

 **[ Marcus Kane ]** have you celebrated yet?

She frowns, giving herself a mental note to scold him the next time she sees him for interrupting her when she’s trying to make dinner before thumbing out a reply.

 **[ sent ]** what?

 **[ Marcus Kane ]** Have you watched the news at all in the last 24 hours? Emerson was apprehended inside state lines. He’s still in interrogation but Indra says our outlook is positive. She thinks she can get a confession by morning.

Abby almost drops her phone onto the hot stove where her asparagus is turning to a vibrant green with crimson tipping its rich ends because of the red wine sauce she cooked it in. She might not be a chocolate chip pancakes in the morning type of person but she can still manage a few tricks thanks to online recipes and early days at the hospital. Abby leans back against the counter next to the stove, the heat and the steam sending chills as it teases her spine through her shirt.

 **[ sent ]** that’s amazing! Does this mean Bellamy is free?

 **[ Marcus Kane ]** not yet but soon. We have to get and be able to corroborate Emerson’s statements to convince the DA to drop charges or lower the sentence to probation.

Clarke passes by the kitchen while she’s reading his message. She sniffs the air, inhaling the rich, savory aromas with a smile that’s half pleased, half surprised.

“Don’t stress about the recipe, Mom.” She leans against the counter next to her, arms bumping together. “You’re doing great.”

“What?” Abby looks up at her. “Oh, no. It’s Detective Kane. He sent me a text. I was just responding.” She types out her reply and puts her phone screen-down on the smooth counter surface to resume tending to her vegetables. Clarke’s face etches into confusion briefly before shrugging it away and retreating to the solitude of her room again.

 **[ sent ]** probation? Even though he was blackmailed?

 **[ Marcus Kane ]** he still shot me

His message comes back quickly and she doesn’t have a chance to tuck her phone away again before the chime sounds. She can hear the scornful tone of his voice through the words on the screen. Good. It makes her smile to prod that reaction from him. He deserves it.

 **[ sent ]** I’m aware. You stopped me from making it home at a decent hour that night. I was almost free when you wheeled in.

The alarm goes off on her timer while she’s typing her message. She rushes through typing it before almost burning herself getting the pan of delicious garlic and butter wafting chicken onto the free half of her stove. The alert of his next text message is mixed among the curses and the murmured obscenities as she hopes she’s doing this right. Clarke pokes her head out of her room again, watching her mother fuss over the still-beeping kitchen timer and the two very hot dishes awaiting her attentions. Abby curses him up and down, glaring at the phone with the blinking blue light in the corner for distracting her. Fortunately for both of them, the chicken seems unharmed.

As unharmed as an already dead, covered in butter and parmesean crumbs chicken can be in this case.

 **[ Marcus Kane ]** sorry to be such an inconvenience.

If only he knew.

 **[ sent ]** now you’re making me burn my dinner. apology not accepted. How’s Octavia?

His response is delayed. When a message finally lights her screen it’s a photo of Octavia standing next to Vera in a granite and dark wood kitchen. Octavia isn’t smiling, not like Vera who is sporting the same familiar shade of burgundy lipstick across a broad grin lighting up her entire face, but the young girl isn’t exactly scowling either. She seems caught off guard like this was some candid moment Marcus has managed to steal from her. Vera has a glass of red wine the same shade as her lipstick in her hand, raised toward the phone in salutations. Octavia has a dark bottle of IBC Root Beer to her lips that it takes Abby a long moment to realize is not actual alcohol and Marcus Kane does not have any damage to his brain allowing his underage ward to drink. Strange how a girl the same age as Clarke should look so much older in everything she does. Octavia Blake may be slight and small but she carries herself with an aura not to be questioned. Abby could easily see the young girl pretending to be eighteen or nineteen and no one being bold enough to challenge her.

It saddens her to think that she’s developed that skill. Then she remembers, it probably wasn’t a choice.

 **[ Marcus Kane ]** She’s surviving. I think she misses her brother.

She hates him for this insight. She can’t stand how easy he makes it look to understand a closed-off girl like Octavia Blake.

 **[ draft ]** the brother you locked up? [ **DELETED ]**  
**[ sent ]** family’s important. I’m sure she appreciates what you’re doing for them.

Kane doesn’t text her again that evening. Abby fixes two plates that she and Clarke enjoy standing together at the counter. Clarke didn’t know about Bellamy but she’s happier than Abby was to hear the news. Abby shows her the picture of Vera and Octavia which brings a familiar smile to her daughter’s cheeks. The dishes are left for tomorrow and Abby puts away the paperwork she brought home to join Clarke on the couch, tucking her feet underneath her legs in her most comfortable soft cotton pajamas to watch a rerun of Grey’s Anatomy. Their favorite late-night game is to watch and see how many medical improbabilities Clarke can point out without Abby’s assistance. Tonight she gets all of them and smiles proudly to herself when Abby congratulates her after its over.

She hopes that Marcus Kane and his family are having a nice night too.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A short but fluffy chapter. Thanks to everyone who continues to comment or give kudos or genuinely is invested in this little story! Much love to all of you!


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